LOUISVILLE, KY. (WDRB) -- As the Southeastern Conference keeps light from falling on Atlantic Coast Conference football teams, Clemson snatches the leftover love from its ACC brethren.
Maybe that will change Saturday night.
I’ll say it: The ACC would benefit from a Miami victory at Clemson.
The ACC would become a more relevant place if the final standings were no longer as predictable as Dabo Swinney showing up in that trademark orange baseball cap.
Neither Mike Krzyzewski and Duke nor Roy Williams and North Carolina have touched the dominance Swinney has created at Clemson.
The record shows that Clemson has won 43 of its last 45 ACC games. Pittsburgh, by one point, and Georgia Tech, by three, are the only ACC programs to topple the Tigers during that thunderous stretch.
Clemson has not lost an ACC game by more than a field goal since Georgia Tech handled the Tigers 28-6 on Nov. 15, 2014.
That’s great for Swinney, who upgraded Clemson from a nice regional football program to a national brand.
It’s a mustard stain on the lapel of the ACC football.
The Tigers have become Apple, Facebook, Goldman Sachs.
Respected. Feared.
And difficult to root for.
The rest of the ACC has become anonymous.
Clemson has the best players. The best coaches. The best facilities.
The Tigers have everything except the thing the ACC needs to elevate the league’s national profile: a legitimate rival, somebody to make Clemson sweat.
The ACC would be infinitely more interesting if Virginia Tech, North Carolina, Louisville, Florida State or Miami put a serving of legitimate fear in the Tigers.
Miami (3-0 and ranked No. 7) gets the next crack.
“(Miami coach) Manny Diaz will have to answer questions all week talking about how Clemson is the bar, not only in the ACC, but also the country,” analyst Kirk Herbstreit said on the ESPN College Football Podcast this week.
“Now you get a chance to go on the road and take on Trevor Lawrence and Travis Etienne and Brent Venables. You have watched these guys play in big games and now you are going to get thrown into the ring with them and you are going to find out how good you are.
“We will see. (Miami’s) front line guys are capable athletically. I don’t think they have the depth. I think they are trying to build that. We will find out where Miami is.”
Miami offensive coordinator Rhett Lashlee sort of, kind of tried to splash some garlic into the rivalry Tuesday. He said that Clemson was well known for its ability to steal play-calls from the opposing sidelines. Before anybody could twist his words into a crawl across ESPN, Lashlee said Clemson was just one of many schools adept at sign stealing and it was not against the rules.
Nice try, coach. But to give the rivalry more than fake juice, Miami must do more — like win the game Saturday night as a 14-point underdog.
Sources say Clemson dispatched Miami by a combined margin of 96-3 in 2015 and 2017, the last two times the programs played. Can you imagine Howard Schnellenberger, Jimmy Johnson or Dennis Erickson accepting 96-3?
The Hurricanes were supposed to serve as one of the league’s national brands when Miami was recruited from the Big East in the summer of 2003.
A program that won five national titles from 1983-2001 has not delivered a Top-10 finish in the final AP college football poll since joining the ACC.
The Hurricanes have played in more Peach, Independence and Sun bowls (two each) than major bowls (one — Orange, 2017) during that period.
This should be a great weekend for ACC football. The Big 12 lost its marquee matchup with Oklahoma and Texas stumbling into the Red River Shootout off ugly losses.
The Big 10 and Pac-12 are at least two weeks away from the joining the fun.
The SEC lineup tilts heavily toward Tennessee’s Show-Me visit to Georgia. It’s too soon to expect Lane Kiffin and Ole Miss to scuff Nick Saban’s sneakers at Alabama.
The ACC has a stronger card. Louisville and Georgia Tech own Friday night with their ESPN matchup in Atlanta.
Saturday will open with another intriguing matchup of ACC unbeatens: Virginia Tech at North Carolina. After slogging through North Carolina State at Virginia, Duke at Syracuse and Pitt finally hitting the road (to Boston College), the spotlight will swing back to the ACC in prime time.
Not Florida State at Notre Dame. That’s another column.
The main event will be Miami at Clemson.
We’ll find out if ACC football is ready to become more than a Swinney informercial.
Copyright 2020 WDRB Media. All Rights Reserved.
