Dabo Swinney weighs in on "dangerous" flag-planting trend around college football

One story that dominated the headlines across the college football landscape this weekend was the prevalence of flag planting at mid-field as part of the winning team's postgame celebration. Clemson was one of the teams to experience being on the losing end of a flag-planting (or flag-waiving) controversy as the South Carolina fans and team took to the middle of the field at Memorial Stadium after their dramatic 17-14 road win.

Technically, South Carolina's flag wasn't exactly planted on Clemson's field. Rather, the Gamecocks and their faithful gathered on the Clemson logo to waive their flag and celebrate. Still, it was close enough to a flag-planting episode that Dabo Swinney weighed in on the trend Monday while participating in the ACC Championship Game conference call.

"...I was dead in the middle of it and lucky to get out alive," Swinney said. "It was dangerous. It was scary, and it was dangerous, and we've got to, we got to make sure that doesn't happen anymore, and we can't be hypocrites either. And listen, I honestly hadn't really been a part of much that, but you know, that was something that happened here a couple years ago, and then last year we went down there and we had a player go planting a flag and, and I didn't know about that till after it happened. And, you know, disappointed in that. And then again this year, that seems to be a thing."

Swinney then went on to say that he wants to talk to South Carolina head coach Shane Beamer to make sure that this increasingly dangerous trend doesn't continue in future editions of the Palmetto Bowl.

"...Shane, and I will talk about that and make sure that, you know that doesn't happen moving forward, because that's dangerous, and people could have got hurt. I mean, you know, could have been a bad situation. I know you saw a lot worse at some other places for the same thing. But you know, Shane and I both got to do a better job in that, and we will, I promise you. We win down there next year, whenever we win there again, that ain't, it's not that's not something we're going to do. You know, we're going to make sure that.

"And you know you win how you got bragging rights. You certainly want to celebrate that and be excited about that, as you should. But this can't happen. But it could have really gotten out of hand yesterday, because there's a lot, there's a lot of people down there. And so I think, I think we can all be better there, and we're in that too because I know that that we had a player do that last year down there, and it's not something that we need to really be involved in. Let's win the game. Let's celebrate with our team, and, you know, shake hands, and let's move on. That's what we need to do so. There's a lot that everybody across college football can learn from yesterday because that was a bad look for college football."

Fortunately for everyone involved, the South Carolina celebration didn't get as out of hand as celebrations at other college football stadiums did this past weekend.

At Ohio State, Michigan planted its flag at mid-field after a 13-10 upset victory. After Ohio State players tried to intervene, a brawl broke out between the two teams leading local police officers to deploy pepper spray to stop the violence.

A similar incident occurred after Florida won at Florida State on Saturday. Florida defensive end George Gumbs Jr. planted his team’s flag on Florida State’s logo at Doak Campbell Stadium leading to an altercation between players from both teams.

In the ACC, the NC State Wolfpack tried to plant one of their flags on the mid-field logo of the North Carolina Tar Heels after a 35-30 win. However, UNC wide receiver JJ Jones grabbed the flag before it reached the ground. Of course, this led to a scuffle between the two teams as staff members from the two programs stepped in to de-escalate matters.

Meanwhile, Big 12 rivals Arizona and Arizona State had a brief altercation when an Arizona State player stuck the ASU trident into the mid-field logo at Arizona's stadium after the Sun Devils' blowout win. Fortunately, that incident didn't lead to an all-out brawl as cooler heads prevailed.

Swinney is right in that this trend across the nation needs to stop. Emotions are always going to be high, especially after rivalry games, so to escalate matters by planting a flag is asking for trouble and it is only a matter of time until one of these postgame altercations leads to a serious injury for a player, coach, staff member, or fan. That's why it is great to see Swinney take the lead to try to put an end to flag planting in the Palmetto Bowl.