Many media are down on Clemson headed into 2022, but not Chip Patterson of CBS Sports.
There has been a fair amount of negativity around Clemson football and the prospect of the Tigers returning to playoff contention in 2022.
Given how the Tigers looked for a good chunk of the 2021 season, I understand that, but sometimes the media tends to, uh, over do things just a tad in the never ending race for eyeballs and clicks.
Clemson over/under 10.5 regular season wins?
— Rubbing The Rock (@RubbingTheRock) June 24, 2022
Even so, there’s no getting around the Tigers won 10 games last season, ended the season with the nation’s longest P5 winning streak and are the proud owners of a deep and perhaps unmatched front seven.
Yet, I was still moderately surprised when Patterson picked the over on the win total of 10.5 for Clemson.
"With one of the best defenses in the country, Clemson might not even need the passing game to return to form in order to win the ACC after its six-year run of conference championships was snapped in 2021. However, beating this win total will require better play from the quarterback position and that’s something I expect we will see from either D.J. Uiagalelei or Cade Klubnik. The Tigers have two of their three toughest opponents (NC State, Miami) coming to Death Valley, but the most challenging spot is against Notre Dame in South Bend, where the Fighting Irish beat No. 1-ranked Clemson – quarterbacked by DJU – in a 47-40 in double-overtime thriller in 2020."
It’s difficult to disagree with anything Patterson says there, but typically when a writers mind is set, they will bend over backwards to find reasons that they’re right, even when objective facts say they’re wrong.
Clemson will likely be favored in every game, except the one at Notre Dame
I’m also intrigued by everyone’s perception of Notre Dame. While the Tigers are constantly being hit with the “staff turnover problem” this offseason, no one sees it as a problem that the Irish are breaking in a first time head coach – it just seems to be a given that Marcus Freeman is going to do better than the very good, experienced head coach that just bolted for LSU.
Patterson avoids that trap, at least explicitly, and to be fair Notre Dame is a very good team, but we’ve yet to see one play of Freeman as a head coach under the pressure of the Notre Dame job.
Dabo certainly had growing pains as a young head coach and it took several years for him to become the coach he is now.
It’ll be an interesting subplot to the game in South Bend tin November.