Love Him Or Hate Him, Clemson Has Found A New Tiger King
It was October 13th, 2008, and Clemson's Tommy Bowden stepped down from being the head coach after a 3-3 start. The Tigers needed to move quickly at naming an interim head coach to take the season, and they turned the tables over to their wide receiver coach, Dabo Swinney.
It only took the world about a day or so to know who Swinney was after he gave one of the best introductory press conferences you'll ever hear from a new head coach.
Swinney was all about buying in and wanting his players to do the same thing, and two words were spoken very loud and clear, and those words were ALL IN.
Swinney wanted his players to be all in and buy what he was selling, and change the program not a few years down the road but change it right at that moment.
Swinney salvaged the 2008 season by going 4-3, making a bowl game, and being named the permanent head coach.
The Tigers turned into one of the best college football programs under Swinney, and they were right there, with Alabama as the most dominant team in college football over the past decade.
Clemson has attended six College Football Playoffs and four National Championships, winning two since 2015.
In 2021 and 2022, Clemson did not make the playoffs, but they did have double-digit wins in both of those seasons.
The 2023 season has gotten off to a rough start with a record of 5-4, but they just got a massive win over Notre Dame when they needed it the most, and that win was crucial for a vast reason.
The New Tiger King
Who would have ever thought that back in 2008, a wide receiver coach nobody had ever heard of would take over at one of the most prominent schools in the country and bring them back to the promised land and reach levels the program has never seen before?
What Swinney has done in these last 16 seasons has been incredible. He might be one of the most hated coaches in the sport over some of the crazy things he says at times, but at the end of the day, he is one heck of a football coach, and you can tell he is a class act by how his players and other coaches respond to him.
At the time, Swinney's little phrase ALL IN was just something that sounded cool and gave hope to the players and fans, but 16 years later, ALL In has become what the Clemson Tigers are all about.
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