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Podcast: Clemson Sports Talk Episode: The “QB Questions & Coaching Changes” Edition Transcript: At it's time, Boyd, let's send Sports Talk with Lawton Swann. Tell What Wow. So you could continue to pick over the fence at the best radio showing the nation. I'm a Carolina fan. I would listening to your show, and I want to compliment you on your even handedness between Clemson and Carolina. What Wow. I listened to the sports talk radio all over the nations, but the what do you come across makes me sick. You're gonna find yourself not on the radio. Finally, Clemson Sports Talk has come back. Two drive time. Hell everybody, Lowton Swan back in the saddle once again. It is the show that shakes the South plane. Clemson Sports Talk for you each and every afternoon as you make your way around the great state of South Carolina and beyond, listening to us on incredible radio stations like Fox Sports Radio fourteen hundred in the Midlands, heard around the world on the iHeart Radio application downloaded today, It's free. The website put the dot com on a dog on it. That's Clemson Sports Talk dot com. And as always, to show the shakespare south Land is brought to you in part by our good friends over at Mets Plumbing mets plumber dot com two two six one eight. That's Mets Plumbing two two six seven to one zero eight. Give them a call to day, let them know we sent you, and again their website mets plumbing dot com. All right, lots to digest off of Clemson's spring game as best you can, given the fact that one, that thing's not televised to about twenty five thousand people showed up. Three you had multiple players that were injured and out, and four, really the storyline continued to be Tate Reynolds and you know whether or not you believe that he can develop into a solid number one for Clemson or if he becomes a capable backup in Christopher Vezena becomes the guy at quarterback heading into a huge matchup against LSU. But regardless of all of that, I don't you know, I think there have been years where the game's been televised and you felt like you've gotten to see two pretty solid, you know, pretty solid groups going at each other. But even then the takeaways, you know, if the quarterbacks through four interceptions, that meant the defense had four, is that a positive or negative? And what I have learned over the years is just not to take too much away from the spring game. It's never as good or as bad as it seems, and quite frankly, once you get about two weeks out from the spring game, maybe more the focus is not going to be on the spring anymore. It's going to be about that upcoming season and what do things look like as the Tigers ner fall camp, and that will be I think, you know, the thing that you really need to focus on. Not a lot, not a lot the love or hate really about the spring game. But I do want to go through in our number two Dabosweeney's comments and not play them for you. We played some of them for you yesterday, but legitimately kind of go through them and talk about the things that I don't know if they're right word would be non answers, but where you're just kind of left going, I don't know if that really says anything at all one way or the other. Right, just sort of where Dabo Sweeney might for some people. As we got a message from Tiger Chuck yesterday, just sort of feels like it's a little bit of a sunshine pump Maybe we can judge it by sunshine pumpage from Dabo Sweeney. The other news though, that has happened over the past couple of days, and this is where I do want to begin today. We obviously know that Clemson's coaching staff on the basketball team has had some significant changes. You had coach donalin Go take the job at Eastern Michigan. You had Dick Bender announce his retirement. You also heard the news that coach Reynolds would be stepping away. Reynolds was an assistant on Brad Branels staff for five years, and some people thought he might be heading towards retirement, but it sounds more and more like he's just gonna take a little bit of a break. And part of it was because, as he noted in his statement, that the decision was not made easily and that following the loss of his mother this past December, he had time to reflect and just felt like he couldn't devote the same effort and time to coaching that he needed to because of dealing with these family matters. So Jeff Reynold's going to step away, potentially retire, but maybe he decides to return. I don't have his age right here in front of me, but he's been around the game for many years, and it is certainly older than Brad Brownell. But after all of those changes, Clemson did announce the hiring of three new coaches, will begin with Chad Warner, so Chad Warner joins Brad Brunell's staff. After the announcement was made, there was a meeting, I think yesterday of the Trustees' Board of Trustees Compensation Committee, and the news came out. Warner spent the twenty twenty five to twenty twenty six season as an assistant coach at Minnesota and was spent the previous three seasons at Furman, so he's very familiar obviously with the Upstate and he was an assistant at Furhman before being promoted to associate head coach there in twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five. That twenty twenty four to twenty twenty five Furman Paladin team finished twenty five to ten in advanced to the Southern Conference Championship title game and played in the nit Warner assisted leading the twenty twenty two to twenty twenty three Paladins, the twenty eight wins, highlighted by a eighty eight seventy nine victory over Chattanooga and then topping four seeded Virginia in the NCAA Tournament in Orlando sixty eight sixty seven, a moment that I'm sure everybody remembers. Talk about, a spectacular finish in a magical moment. Not necessarily not the exact same as the situation with Duke and Yukon, but pretty dog gone close, Pretty dog gone close, quite frankly, maybe the closest we've seen too that in the NCAA Tournament. Since he began his collegiate coaching career at Georgia. That's his album mater as a grad assistant under Jim Herrick. He graduated from Georgia back in nineteen ninety eight with a bachelor's degree in journalism and then earned a walk on spot under head coach Hugh Durham. After graduating from Georgia, he was an associate head coach at the Darlington Schools for four years, so that's one of the three hires. Brad Bronell and Clipson also brought in coach Andre Morgan to be an assistant coach and director of quality control. Looking at Morgan's career, he came from Cincinnati, where he was on that staff, beginning back in April twenty twenty one as an assistant for Wes Miller. Of course, Miller was fired at the end of this season, but during his time at Cincinnati, the Bearcats won one hundred games, including two twenty one seasons. Morgan was at Cincinnati after spending the previous three years as an assistant coach at Middle Tennessee State in Conference USA, and he has been around, but he was two thousand and five McDonald's All American Honorable mention playing in Class two A in Georgia, where he averaged twenty point three points at ten point one rebounds at Buford High School and led the Wolves to the state semi final with a twenty three and eight record and finished his career as the school's all time leading score with fifteen hundred and three total points. That's coach Andre Morgan, who maybe has good ties to the state of Georgia based off of his track record back in high school. And then, perhaps the most significant addition for Brad Brownell is coach Chris Harriman. Harriman will only change zip codes as he was previously on Chris Mack's staff at Charleston. Mac took the job at South Florida, if my memory serves me correctly on that one from a couple of days ago when I saw that news. But he was with coach mack down there at Charleston from twenty twenty four through twenty twenty six, helping guide the program to forty five victories in two seasons, including a twenty four to nine overall record back in twenty twenty four twenty five. Herreman has twenty four years of experience in the Big ten, PAC twelve, Mountain West Atlantic ten, and prior to his time at Charleston, he was on the staff at Saint Louis in a couple of stints there. He spent four seasons at cal served as the associate head coach at New Mexico, and also spent some years at Nebraska. One of the things that you know, I think a lot of people like about Harman is the fact that he is widely regarded for his international recruiting prowess and global knowledge of the game. And I saw a tweet from John blou with a posting courier noting the same thing, and then it got me back to thinking about what we noted yesterday when we were talking about out some of these teams, but even more specifically Illinois in the NCAA Tournament, and they're very versatile and European roster that has been put together. Jeff Goodman, who's CBS Sports, you know he's their national basketball insider, called Harriman one of the top three international recruiters in Division one basketball. Gary Parrish, another college basketball insider, said few guys have the international networking and contacts like Harriman. He's the long term valuable higher, the guy who finds a gym buried under twenty feet of mud. Harriman played at Augusta State with the Jaguars in Georgia and helped them win three division titles and make three NCAA Tournament appearances. He played four years professionally in Australia with their National Basketball League with the Sydney Kings the Hunter Valley Pirates, and was the runner up for the NBL Rookie of the Year award back when he was playing so solid pick up there on all fronts. I think for Clemson, one thing's for sure, the staff got younger with this move. And it's listen, there's nothing against nothing against age by any means. With Jeff Reynolds and Dick Bender, but the staff did get younger, they probably got a little bit more relatable, and maybe more than anything, with the pickup of Harriman, it sounds like you've got a guy that can go out and find the right pieces internationally as well as as state side. Now state side, speaking for Clemson, some good news on the basketball front came out yesterday as we saw the information or as we saw some information that will certainly make you all happy, that Zach Foster has decided he will return to Clemson for another year. That news coming from the field of sixty eight. So Zach Foster will return. He was a former top sixty five recruit and in twelve games he was averaging nearly seven points per contest, nearly three assists, and three rebounds. Obviously, the ACL injury that he had against South Carolina stole what was certainly beginning to build itself into a major freshman year at Foster. The one thing you can hope, I would say, in this day and age, is that if he sticks around, continues to work out, get his body better, that this coming year can still be a blossoming season for him. And who knows how long a kid like this will stay, you know, in college or at Clemson in this current era. But I have said it, I will say it on the record again. I think he's the best NBA talent Clemson has had in a while, probably the best NBA talent Clemson has had since Sharon Right maybe. And again, I don't think he's going to be a top a top five pick in the NBA draft any means like Right was, but it was right six. Sharon Right may have been number six. Let me see, well I could just I can just clear that up real quick. He's not gonna be a top ten pick, uhuh, like Sharon Wright. I know for a fact Sharon Wright was a top ten pick he was drafted. Now, I just gotta know was he six or four? I feel like I used to know this off the he was six? All right, great, So not gonna be a top ten pick. I don't think at the end of his career like Sharon Wright. But he's got a chance to be I think a first round selection given the assets that he has, and he's not a selfish ballplayer in an era where if you're willing to pass the ball you could get court Tom in the NBA if you're willing to share the ball and find the open shooter because everybody can shoot. Man, Yeah, book him. But for Clemson that was some significant news as well. And you know, I know with Carter Wellings injury taking when it did and his size, you know, being a near seven footer, I struggle to think that he's gonna be available the first half of the season next year. And I would not encourage a kid like that to sit a full year. I don't even know if that's something he would consider anyway, But I definitely don't think Carter Welling will be ready, at least not until the calendar turns to January. You know, when Chad swag Kelly bounced back five months later or whatever it was from knee surgery. That's that's one thing that's a six foot one kid when you're talking about a six foot ten, six foot eleven guy, with the way those guys have to move on the basketball court and start and stop, and I just, you know, I don't know if it's if it's due will to even believe that he'll be back before January one, twenty twenty seven A zero three four five zero zero eighty six text line, phone line, and again, you could be a part of the program anytime, any place, anywhere on our website that's Clemson Sports saw dot com. But I thought those news items on the basketball front kind of given the direction of the program, the pieces that are gonna be needed to put in place the job that Brad Brownell did this past season, which certainly was an overachieving group. And honestly, to think about it, do you believe that Clemson would have lost to Iowa if Carter Welling is playing? I think most of you feel like I do, that they probably win that game. And I don't think that Clemson would have beaten Florida with Carter Welling. I don't even think I would have picked it. But if I'm being fair, knowing what I know and watching what I watch from Iowa, I would have to say, at this point, why couldn't it happen? And so Clemson might have been a game away from making a little bit of a run with this team that Brad Brownell put together like an Amazon order basically, and it had all these guys that came in and it worked well. The future could potentially continue to be very bright for this Clemson Tiger basketball team, if the right pieces get into place, because you've got guys like Zach Foster, you've got guys like a Spuckner. Those are the big building pieces. I mean, that's the that's the couch, that's the the all the men like, that's all the key pieces, the television set, the coffee table. On what Brad Brownell's got to add for the most part. And listen, it'd be nice if you could get if you could get another another couch. I won't say a lazy boy, that sounds terrible, but if you can get, you know, another signature piece. Perfect. But some of those other pieces just got to kind of be the knickknacks that are around the room. And Brad Brownell's got a lot of the substance that they need to really have a good basketball team, a very competitive basketball team next year. But I think these coaching hires could go a long way to certainly adding to that. And I think it helps Brad Brownell given the reputation of what they did this past season. But we got a break coming up when we come back. Man. The shot heard around the world in the NCAA tournament, it was amazing, and the camera angle on Bill Raftery was spectacular, Stay with US Clemson's Sports Tall Loud and swam back with you on a Tuesday afternoon. So we've talked a good bit here over the past couple of days about the shot heard around the world in college basketball over the weekend as yukon top Duke on what was simply phenomenal Brayln Mullins hitting the game winner, and I mentioned talking with William qualkin Bush on the program yesterday about Bill Raftery and also Grant Hill, the Duke graduate, a Duke graduate kind of letting that shot marinate while Iron Eagle Iron Eagle was on the call. And it was a great historic college basketball moment, there is no doubt about that. But William qualkin Bush noted he said, Man, you know what's great is watching the angle of Bill Raftery reacting to that shot, and it really was. So we played yesterday the audio from CBS, which I thought was incredible. The snapping of the net was easily one of the great moments in this tournament. And I don't I don't you know, I did pick Duke to win, So it would have been nice if Duke would have kept winning for my bracket. But I don't really want Duke to be the national champion. But I don't really want Yukon to be the national champion either. But what was lost in the show yesterday was that I only played the game winning shot in the sound of that moment, which was no doubt electric. But here's the the you know, the remainder of it all. After Bill Raftery and and Grant, he'll finally react to it. So here here's what it sounded like. And I did retweet this yesterday. I just forgot to mention that here on the program. Caravan two seconds tosses it up. It's gone, We're poor. Three he goes in the. Short utterly impossible. Marsh means trauma, the deflection, the reaction, and that the major nudgends out of Indiana. They all did suit for see the stouty the freshman Raylan Mullins want to play, I'll do the do was hold the ball there? They didn't need to get rid of it, don't back court violation nothing. I mean, that's awesome. And here's the thing. I don't want to toot my own horn, but too like I do feel like in my expertise of covering Clemson and everything that goes on with the Tigers. I really try to react to everything the way Grant Hill did there. I know his heart sunk. I know he felt terrible that his beloved Duke Blue Devils fell, but in that moment he is appreciating what's happening on the other side and the play that Brayln Mullin's mate. I mean that that is like, I don't know who the best in the business in terms of basketball announcing are. I do always enjoy listening to Raftery drop a good man man and the good onions and he squeezed in an onion there. I think Iron Eagle is definitely trending towards the top. And obviously this was a huge game with Yukon and Duke battling in the Elite eight for the right to go to the Final four. But again, even in that video, the snap of the net is just gorgeous. It's it's the thing that I think probably made me felt well. A couple of things made me fall in love with basketball. Number one, when I was a kid going to games, the sneakers on the court and that squeak. Number two was the smell of popcorn in the arena. And number three was when you're alone in the gym and you're shooting hoops and there's no noise except for that dribble, that bounce in that snap of the net one more time, Bill Raftery, Grant Hill an iron eagle two seconds. It's God where poor great goes in Then. Utterly impossible, more strange trauma, that deflection, the reaction, and that the major nudgends out of it. Theiana they all did suit. For see astounding the freshman Raylen Mullins. Want to play. All Duke had to do was hold the pole stely. They didn't need to get rid of it. The back court violation nothing, utterally impossible. The major onions a Bill Bill don't ever change because as great as the shot, I mean, there's no doubt as great as that shot is the way that trio, and that's probably tough, a trio working together and doing that the way they do in the NCAA tournament. You know, most of the time you're talking about a two man team on the call. But to get that insight and the observation from those three individuals in that moment was something to behold now there was another little controversial moment that took place with one of my nephews. I would say, I don't want to say friends colleagues. Roger Ayers who was one of the officials in that game, and certainly Roger Ayres and Dan Hurley and Roger Ayers and John Shire know each other. As a matter of fact, I would argue Airs is probably the top official in the game. As a matter of fact, you might remember a year ago in the NCAA tournament, it was Roger Ayers who when there was a player trying to sub into the NCAA tournament late clock was gonna run out, gave the old whistle, oh wet spot on the floor, stop the game to get the kid in, so that he could say, at some point in his life he played in an NCAA tournament game, regardless of the outcome. You know, he he gets the bigger picture of it all. But there was a moment right after that shot took place. Then a lot of people are saying Danny Hurley, who is a crazy man on the sideline, may have deserved a technical foul. I'll tell you what happened right after this Clemson Sports Talk Lord Swan, don't forget about our friends in Alumni Hall right there on the corner of campus on College Avenue, downtown Clemson for your officially licensed Clemson merchandise, hass T shirts, Telgate gear and more. Get yourself ready for summer, get yourself ready for the heat at Doug Kingsmore Stadium. Stop into Alumni Hall today and of course signed up to become in Alumni Hall Rewards pass member shop. Where I shop, It's Alumni Hall where Tiger fans shop as well online at alumni haul dot com. So Dan Hurley, Dan Hurley is sometimes insane, I mean legitimately looks insane, acts insane, does insane things on the court. He's off his nut, some people might say at times. So this is the biggest moment of the entire NCAA basketball tournament. I mean, we played the audio and the response from Iron Eagle and Bill Raftery and Grant Hill just before the break, right just a little bit ago. And if you miss that, I hate it for you because it's spectacular, but I also love you enough to Reracket one final time. Caravan two seconds tosses it up, utterly impossible. It goes on. But that's my favorite underly impossible, Bill Raftery there the snap of the net still gets me. But just after that, I don't quite understand what's happening. And I've watched this video. Honestly, I've watched this video more times than I've watched the shot by Braydon Mullins. That's how peculiar to me, as someone that loves this game, that's how peculiar this moment was. So the shot is made and Dan Hurley's jacket is sort of hanging off of his chest, and Roger Ayres is coming over and he something to Hurley and they go head to head headbutt. Literally. Hurley never responds to anything, he doesn't say anything, he doesn't look agitated with Roger Ayres. Heirs, I believe is probably instructing to him that he's going to go to the monitor to check the time, like he's just kind of making him aware of that moment. But if you watch the video, the argument could be made that this is illegal contact with the official, almost intimidating contact with the official, enough that some people have argued that they're unequivocally should have been an immediate technical foul and an ejection on Dan Hurley in that moment. Now here's what I'll say, regardless of what kind of nut job Dan Hurley might be, I don't think anybody wants to see that moment stolen from Braylen Mullins by Roger Airs making a call in a moment where again, it doesn't look it's not like Hurley is agitated with him. You know what, this appears more than anything, It would appear like just before the end of the game, Dan Hurley went to Roger Ears with ten seconds left, when the Duke's about the inbound and said, Hey, we're gonna win this game. I bet you watch what we do right here. And then it happened. And then you're walking over to your buddy, a guy that you know pretty well, and you're like, yeah, what I tell you, right in his face. You're not saying that, you're just eye to eye with him. But if you watch it, you can clearly wonder why there wasn't a technical foul called. I don't think Airs would want to steal that moment from the kid. Sure Duke fans would love for him to have done it. One thing it certainly would have done, in my opinion, it might have finally put Dan Hurley in his place. He needs to be put in this place. He is pompous, he is arrogant, he is rude to the media, and something like that to cost his team the game would have never been forgotten, never been forgotten in stores Connecticut. But he was allowed to get away with it by Roger Airs. And I don't know what the appropriate thing to do there. If you're heirs. My assumption is again that they are just good not good friends. That's probably not the right way to put it. Seth Greenberg, though, was asked about it on ESPN, and Greenberg said that he had indeed talked to Roger Airs. Again, these guys know each other, they're all friends. He had indeed talked to Roger and Ears didn't seem like he knew what he was talking about. Here's Seth Greenberg after the victory talking about this on ESPN. There's a lot of talk social media. I know that's where you'd spend most of your time. Yeah, a lot of time there on the Dan Hurly headbutt of the Official. First of all, you know, when you talk about social media, if you were not going to take advice from someone, why would you listen to what they said on social media there answering to the question, but. This situation right in. First of all, Roger Ears is the best official in all of college basket, was tremendous communicator. There isn't and he wrote a ton of my games. There were games where he's put his arm around me walking me back to my bench. There's times where he said, seth, that's enough. But that situation right there, that is absolutely nothing. I talked to Roger today. He said, what are you talking about? He literally didn't know what I was talking about. He said, nothing happened. The ball went in, I was running back, they were celebrating. Danny leaned in said something to me. I said something to him. It was absolutely enough. So you're saying that was coach five it up in his own way in the moment and official interacting with him, which is that guy who is the best communicator in all of college basketball as an official, guy you had won on every single one of your games home road, favored, not favored. And then I spoke to Dan as well. Yeah, and Dan said he didn't understand what was going on. He has so much respect for Roger. It's never had a problem with him. Now he's been walked back like they all have during the course of a game. But that, literally, that was social media trying to create something out of nothing because of Dan Hurley's allegedly reputation. He's a fiery guy, so the reputations itself. I'm shocked. You don't listen to everything social media says. What I mean, Look, I coached for thirty three years. If I listen. So there's the explanation, basically from the horse's mouths plural form. I don't like what we saw. You shouldn't like it either, But Rodger Ayers and Dan Hurley make it sound like it wasn't anything to it, and maybe there's a different angle and we're just seeing it from the wrong angle. That would be one thing I could definitely tell but or definitely say about it all. But man, what a weird situation that could have cost Yukon Final Segment flip side final Segment hour number one on a Tuesday. Sticking with the NCAA tournament, that Duke Yukon game, which was just phenomenal. Man, I would love to be involved in a matchup like that. And Clemson's run to the Elite eight a couple of years ago kind of felt like it had moments like that along the way the run they had to the sweet sixteen, and they beat the breaks off of Auburn as well. I mean, there have been some moments, but I want that, I want the I want to snap of the I want the Braylen Mullins being a Clemson guy. Oh man, Well, you know a lot of times we jinx announcers when they say something and you know it's like, oh, this guy hasn't missed a free throw in the last fourteen basketball games. Games on the line clank. With a minute and twenty seconds remaining in the ballgame, Duke led seventy sixty six and the and I guess CBS in the NCAA, you know, they got like a statistician there on hand threw this graphic up number one. Seeds are one hundred and thirty four to oh when leading by fifteen plus points at half, which Duke led by fifteen at the break. Duke was up at one point in the first half by nineteen points. My buddy texted me after the game had said, you knew when that graphic went up to Duke was gonna lose seventy three seventy two to final score It kind of feels like Duke Yukon's sports talk here in part because that game was just so amazing and so many people turned it off. My buddy, he turned it off. He went out and did yard work, and he came back inside and he asked his Amazon Echo device. I won't say the name because I don't want to mess up your devices, but he said the device's name. He said, who won the or what was the final score? It wasn't who won in his mind, it was what was the final score of the Duke Yukai game? And that bad boy came back seventy three seventy two Yuka. He said, what how? No way? And you look at the you know they have the win probability of the game. I mean, Duke in the first half get to win probability. I think at the highest mark of like ninety eight ninety eight point three, they didn't quite climb into to ninety nine percent, but they got closed ninety eight point seven, I see, I think is the highest. That was when the score was forty four to twenty five, when they were up nineteen, and they maintained that in the nineties, I don't think they got out of a ninety percent chance to win until eleven forty eight left, when Yukon made it a nine point game at fifty six forty seven, and Duke still because again you're talking about the amount that you are up and the time are all factors in this, to the point of where late in the game, with five ZHO three left, Duke's up sixty seven fifty eight. Again, it's still a nine point spread, but you're that ninety five percent chance you're gonna win that ball game. Duke had an eighty nine point six percent, six percent chance to win the game as they were inbounding that basketball or as the ball was in bound it and they go on the loose and it will be an epic moment to turn around for the Huskies. They started I think one of I want to say, one of eighteen from beyond the arc. They finished five of twenty three. They hit their final three point shots and they needed to, and all of that leads us to this what I think is going to be a really good final four with two number one seeds playing in the night cap on Saturday, as Michigan and Arizona faceoff. Michigan thirty five and three on the season, Arizona thirty six and two. I really like what I see from Michigan right now, I really do. And then on the flip side, at six p' oh nine on Saturday, you've got third seed of Illinois and second seeded Yukon. So you got the Big East, two Big Ten teams, and a Big twelve team in Arizona. And if you're uncom comfortable with Arizona being in the Big Twelve, yeah, welcome to my world as well. That's hard to get used to. It's hard to get used to seeing UCLA in the NCAA tournament. Think Big Ten or Again or anybody else. Like I mean, there are just some teams in the world of sports that are so ingrained with their conference that I don't care how long they're out of those leagues. It is going to be tough. I mean, I would imagine for people that callen Stanford simply because of the geography of where they are, to ever correlate them to the Atlantic Coast Conference. You know, I would say at this point, my hope is and will always continue to be that sanity returns to our sports world, maybe that sanity returns to our entire world. But I think My hope, kind of silent in my heart, is that we just get somebody in charge of college sports again that says, you know what, some of this stuff doesn't make a whole lot of sense. And what we're gonna do is make it make sense. We're gonna put some geographic leagues back together, and we're gonna split the money evenly, and we're gonna make sure that every player and you know that there's some sort of pay scale involved, you know, just bring it some normalcy back to this world of college sports that has gone off its rocker. College sports is Dan Hurley. Dan Hurley is college sports. That's that's the way it is, man. Because when I look at Arizona, I immediately think PAC twelve, I'm the Big twelve. To me is sort of like the Big Ten. They're sort of Midwestern schools. The a SEC is the Atlantic, the Southeastern Conference. We kind of know where they're situated in the southeast. The PAC twelve should be on the Pacific coast. This is not rocket surgery, all right, we gotta get our number two coming on. Keep it a lot right here on Fox Sports Radio fourteen hundred each time for. Clipston Sports Talk with Luwton Schwan. So you could continue to peek over the fence at the best ready for showing the naked. I'm a Carolina fan. I would listen to the show, and I want to compliment you on your even hand and the miss between Clemson and Carolina. I listened the sports spot radio all over the nation, but the one do you come across makes me ship You're gonna find your stuff? Not on the radio, it is our number two. That's drivetime rad here on the show the Chase of South Lanta, Clemson Sports at the Swine hanging out with you on a Tuesday. Boy, it's a big day over at the swamp. River Bluff and Lexington. It does not get any bigger than that. When it comes down to soccer rivalries in the Midlands, these two teams hoof crosstown rivals. A lot of these kids grow up with each other in proximity of a lake. Many of them played at either Lexing and Soccer Academy or se united together. Their families work together in some cases. And I mean this is a heated, heated matchup. And I could tell you River Bluff we need this one, We really need this one. After dropping one at Dutch Fork, which is just inexcusable. Inexcusable what happened at dutch Fork that honestly, you know, coaches talk about one game beating you twice. You know, we got beat by Chapin on a header in the final two minutes, and the guys came out and they just looked lethargic. They had a couple of opportunities but never quite capitalized on it. And sometimes when you let the team hang around and they get a goal, then they could kind of switch their tactics, and River Bluff just played on their heels. And inexcusable loss at dutch Fort. I mean, the only, the only, the only loss worse than that that I remember seeing was when Irmo beat us at home last year. That was just unbelievable. That should never have happened. I did feel good for Irmo's coach though it was my son's former travel coach. He's no, he's no longer coaching at Irmo, but I did feel really good about that for him, coach Matt. That great for him, terrible for our team. Is terrible loss. But that loss at dutch Fort hmm. Anyway, I can assure you around here it has not been happy, and if we can put a victory up over lexingon tonight, I'll feel a lot better about it, that's for sure. Speaking of peeling a lot better, man, if you are having trouble at your house with your plumbing, call him today METS Plumbing, METS Plumbing dot com six seven one o eight. That's METS Plumbing two two six seven one zero eight. All right. So I mentioned this a little bit earlier about talking through some of what Dabos Sweeney had to say, and we'll actually hear a little bit more from him, uh, coming up a little later in the show. But I wanted to get into just some of like you know, coaches can kind of give non answers sometimes and maybe even redirect, kind of like a witness on the stand. But there were a couple of real substance, solid moments that I heard from Dabo Sweeney. Now. Number one was the situation at quarterback. And I'm gonna tell you a little bit more about Taton Reynolds in a minute, because there's an interesting interview out there with him that I do want to touch on some things. But Sweeney was pretty adamant that there was separation between number one and number two in everybody else. I mean, he said it's not close. Those guys separated and the Dnsen deal where he's left and we might get back to that in a minute. But more importantly, that was a pretty definitive statement from Dabo Sweeney clarity if you will, about the quarterback situation, which I think you you want to have clarity at that spot more than any other spot, especially at this point. Now, does it mean that Christopher Vezena and Tate Reynolds are the best two quarterback best quarterback common nation Clemson has ever had? Absolutely not right, absolutely not. That's not what that means. I don't even know where these two guys would rank amongst the conference quarterbacks, but amongst the Clemson guys. He said it. They separated, and Sweeny talked about Tate Reynolds having elite arm talent. More on that in a little bit, but he talked about how Reynolds has just gotten better and better and better. Now another area where Swenny said something that I went, Okay, that's probably good, but I don't know how you measure it when he said that Clemson was quote much improved defensively, secondary wise, we're just way better. And the thing that that takes me back to more than anything I think is Collie Barnes. And so I've got a theory on Khalil Barnes for better or worse, And I have told you I like Khalil is a great interview. He had some moments though this past year that left a lot of people angry at him, a lot of fans really frustrated by Khalil Barnes. But I started thinking about Khalil and like what he was coming out of high school, which was a three star prospect, and he ends up right being a pretty big playmaker early on in his career, but he never really grew, like he never really exploded on the scene to becoming this Jiron Curse level safety for Clemson or TJ. Green. Like he peaked, he plateaued, and that might have been why he was considered a three star prospect. Had he been a five star prospect or a high value four. Then maybe year one where he shows up and kind of shocks people, make some big plays, including a scoop and score for a touchdown against South Carolina and an interception on the next play, maybe his trend gets better and better and better, but that didn't seem to be the trend for him, and that might have been why he wasn't a higher valued recruit. Maybe people felt like he was closer to plateauing. And finally, one of the other takeaways that I think had some real substance to it was, you know, his conversations about the offense's limitations due to injuries, Like, I think that's legit. I mean, when you're missing key wide receivers because of injuries and things of that nature, that's gonna only hamper that quarterback play that we talked about earlier. So if I if you know that, if you know X that wide receivers are out, then I think it is safe to say that on why the quarterback side of things like X and Y, right like not like Y why, but I think on why that the quarterbacks would probably have had an even better observation from Dabosweeney had those you know, whiteout's been healthy and while you still had some young guys make it some plays like Gordon Sellers, you kind of take where the quarterbacks are and go, Okay, they're probably better with these even better wide receivers out there with them. And so that's probably a positive on both fronts that the white out room is going to get better and the quarterback room is probably going to play better once the healthy wide receivers are there. Now some fluff, you know, things that he kept saying that probably were driving some of y'all crazy. He kept talking about it was a productive spring, and there's a lot of enthusiasm. Yeah, I don't know, that's not really measurable and it doesn't really give you any results. Enthusiasm. Those are things that stood out and that popped up a good bit. You know, a lot of enthusiasm, The guys are enthusiastic, and finally some things that I think we all should still be question Certainly, whatever is going on with Nolan Hoosier has to be a bit of a question mark. Now. Sweeney admitted that Hoosier and Robert Gunn both made what was at forty four and fifty six yard kicks at the end of the scrimmage. But Hoosier has kind of been in and has called Dabo's eyr a little bit here during the spring, and that's not a position where I feel like you should see a ton of regression as a kid moves forward. I mean, that's a spot where I feel like you should only get better. And if Nolan Hoosier is not better this season than he was as a freshman, that should be a concern for Clemson because I think they are going to need. You know, points for this group are at a premium. That's it. Points are the premium. And you know, when you get a drive, maybe you get a turnover near midfield and you get down there and field goal range, it's kind of an iffy do we punt? You just kind of you get to the point where it's just like all right, we either got to go forward or kick it. But man, if you can convert those kick, you know, those opportunities into points, it can just change the game, especially if you made a big play, you're stolen some momentum, you drive it down, you get in field goal range, you got a shot, you miss it. They get better field positioned because you missed it, and then they turn around and score a touchdown. That's like a ten point swing. So that's one the kicker concerns. You know, it's something that I certainly think we have to look into a little bit further. And then the other the other thing, I think we need a little more research on is what's gonna happen with Chris Denson. And this is not directly a quarterback thing here, but where is his value as a player for Clemson in Chad Morris's offense? And maybe the bigger question becomes, let's say he doesn't move from quarterback. Are there some packages where you could put him in at quarterback or even a situation where maybe you put Dnson on the field and another quarterback to sort of dictate to the defense something that they want to do, and then depending on what they go with, then maybe you shift and you put Dentson at quarterback and the other wide out flanks out and now all of a sudden you feel good about Dnson's ability to make a play in the box. Like I do, think there's a positive on the creative front for Clemson with Dentson being around, And it doesn't have to mean that he's got to be an elite passer at this point in his career. And I think it is fair when Dabosweeny says this team has a long way to go, I tend to agree. I don't know what the ceiling is. I Michael Jordan said it best the ceiling is the roof. I don't know. I really don't know how high this you know, how far this team can go. I have a ton of questions. There are certainly things that that Dabosweeney left sort of very ambiguous. I think it's the right way to say it. But there was also some substance surrounding that quarterback room and then Tate Reynolds. And that's where I want to turn my attention in the next segment, because I think things have been so I'll call it awkward for Clemson football. When Davos Weni and Clemson are climbing the mountain and they hadn't won a national title since nineteen eighty one, and Davos when he's saying things about how good somebody is or how great a player is, it was pretty easy to buy in on it because you wanted to believe it, you wanted to see it, and then those things started happening, and so then, as Dabo says the next thing, you're like, yes, and then it's happening. This is if if I was given like stock advice or lottery number advice or whatever, and you started winning, you guys would come back to me and go, Swanny, tell us more, tell us more. Well, even if we got you to the mountaintop a couple of times with national championships, you come back again, you say, Swanny, tell us more, and I say, well, here's the numbers, here's what I'm thinking. And you keep losing, and they keep sticking a microphone in front of me, and I keep telling you, Hey, these are the winners, these are the things. This guy's progressing. This isn't intangible. Blah blah blah blah blah. The end pretty soon. If my numbers aren't hidden, You're going, Swanny, what do you? What do you? What are you talking about? You don't know what you're talking about. You you're so far off. And so that's where I kind of think Sweeney is if if Clemson was still in the climb, if the Tigers had never reached the mountaintop, I do think people right now would be more apt to believe what Dabosweeney said. I do I believe that if they had not made it to the top yet, you would still be so hungry for him to be right that you would buy into the things that he's telling you. But because you've been to the mountaintop, and you have fallen well short the past few years, the past five years really, since that twenty twenty team, since COVID COVID killed Clemson, since that COVID year, you haven't been able to get back to where you once were. You haven't been elite. And I know you've been to the playoffs, but you haven't been elite. But because of that fact now when Dad was, when he says something everybody everybody kind of has it, will prove it, prove it. And maybe if he doesn't win national titles, he's not even here right now to have people frustrated with him, you know, if twenty sixteen and twenty eighteen don't happen, if Clempson has constantly fallen just short, I mean, I'm assuming he's still here, but I don't know. I think those Natties put him in a spot where I've always said, you can't get rid of him. But any way, I mean, there are certainly some things that this team needs to be able to do better this year than they did a year ago. Probably running the ball is one of them. But from top to bottom with Dabo Sweeney and how you feel about him, I think a big part of it is is because he got you to the top and you keep falling short now and you don't want to hear it. You want results again. All the quips best is the standard. Like all that for you still resonates and you want to see it and maybe it'll happen, and maybe it'll be a freshman fellow at quarterback, Tate Reynolds. Well, we live in a unique era. Trust me. I know. I've been recording podcast for over twenty one years. I've been doing a radio show here for nearly fifteen. What I can tell you is that we are in a great era for getting to know players. I'll tell you what Clemson has done and is continuing to do. If you didn't know about it, it's a great way to learn about Tate Reynolds when we get back. Keep it a lot right here on Fox Sports Radio fourteen hundred Clemson Sports Salt Laud the Swan back with you on a Tuesday after Nude. You know, one of the cool things about I guess this era that we're living in is that we get some exposure to Clemson players that maybe we wouldn't normally get through their podcast that Clemson Football has called two right turns like back when I started doing this my radio show, which started as a podcast and it's still podcasted. If I had gone to the coaching staff and said, hey, you know what, uh, I'd like to interview this freshman player, they would have told me no. I mean, that's just the way it is, like you would not be getting this type of access to these guys if it weren't controlled by Clemson and that podcast. An interview is up on YouTube, but Tate Reynolds was obviously ask a lot of different questions throughout this interview with him. It was about ten minutes something like that. Not much longer than that. Let me just double check the link. I'll nine minutes. It felt yeah, it fell like Tim felt like him. But he was asked about you know what the reason went into choosing Clemson. And the thing that we mentioned here on the program about Tate Reynolds that you might recall is that he was injured his senior year and people wondered if the year away from the sport would kind of slow his progression towards being a starting quarterback at the collegiate level, and if the early indications are accurate and if Dabos Sweeney and Chad Morris are being true to their word and fair and honest with what's going on, then it doesn't look like that held him back at all. But he's got some intangibles that I think are very tough to teach, first and foremost being a baseball player as well. I think the fact that you can get kind of trapped into the zone of a this guy's got to be a quarterback. He's got to be all the time quarterback, and he can't never have played another sport. You know, Dabosweeney is noted in the past he likes guys with a little bit of versatility to him, guys who have done other things. Because if you're great at more than one sport, part of that greatness probably comes from because you're just a competitor, you're a fighter. Because I can assure you there's a kid on the football team who wanted to be the quarterback and probably only focused on quarterback, and there's a kid on the baseball team that wanted to be a pitcher or whatever that only focused on that. But you're good enough to do both. You're a great talent. There's a lot of reasons to believe in a little bit of a diversified player. But Reynolds was asked about you know why Clemson, and he said that his decision wasn't just about recruiting. It was a lot of prayer and he really felt, like he said quote, that the Lord had directed him out here and that still harkens back to the belief that I think a lot of people have about Dabo Sweeney and how faith can help support players who feel very comfortable in this situation. And he also talked about how he was how Clemson left an impression upon him by constantly making the journey out to Arizona to see him, and that, you know, Clemson because of that relationship, not an il, not all of that, which I'm sure is nice. I'm sure he's not hurting, but it was the relationships and the pull of faith that he led to. Now, people describe this kid as somebody that's got a cannon for an arm, and that's probably part of the reason that he was able to excel at both baseball and football. But for Reynolds, his mindset is a little bit different in that he's constantly working on his craft in all facets of his game, including running the ball. You know, having a multi dimensional skill set. And I don't want to pin him into being like a because he's kind of a stocky guy, kind of a built kid. I don't want to pin him into being like a Tim Tebow esque type player for Clemson. But I do think that there's something to his ability to be mobile with the size that he has. You saw that with Taj Boyd when he was in Chad Morris's system, and I'm just wondering if that's been another part of his elevation, mobility and size versus like Chris Denson, mobility and small. But also the addition of having that quote cannon for an arm, as people have noted about him, and with being a top prospect in multiple sports. He competed you around. He said he hated the offseason. You know that to legitimately be a star in both sports, there was rarely downtime. And that again points right back towards the competitive drive, the edge you have to have to win at the highest level, so on and so forth, and so in his career, you know, he's never really been away from baseball, and right now that's kind of his sole focus is football, and it's really the first time he's ever been solely focused on that. He even noted that it's kind of been hard to sit down, but he values the chance to continue to learn, and so, you know, I think that's been a part of his elevation, is that there are some things that he possesses, some traits that he has, and probably among those that I haven't even mentioned, his leadership. You don't get to where he is in multiple sports without being a great leader. You're competitive, you're leader. And if you've got those traits and they're ingrained in you, they start to show up. And you always have. You know, that's saying about you know, the great players show up when the lights are on, and it's quite possible that for this young man that he's made some real strides because the lights have been on and he's taken advantage of that. All right, with a quick break, we'll come back with more here on a Tuesday afternoon, Lawton swan back with you on a Tuesday afternoon. Man, I hope you had a chance to swing by Alumni Hall right there across from Bowman Field, right downtown Clemson. Check out their amazing hat wall. Let them know I sent you. But more importantly, if you are a Clemson student, a faculty member, or in the military, you can get ten percent off when shopping in store at Alumni Hall. It's Alumni Hall where Tiger fans shop. And I'll tell you, I wish Alumni Hall would extend that to like all teachers take your school I d and save ten percent. That would be amazing. I don't think it's like that right now as I know, But for Clemson students, faculty members, in all military you do get ten percent off in Alumni Hall online in Alumni Hall dot com. But the teen percent off is only for shopping in store. Okay, now I talked to you about Tate Renolds a minute ago. Davos Sweeney was asked directly after the spring game if Tate Reynolds could compete in his mind for the starting job against Christopher Vizena. Again, they are one two by a wide margin. According to Sweeny, here's what he had to say. Absolutely absolutely, I think I mean everybody and nobody got lifetime contracts around here. I mean everybody's got to prove it. Everybody's got to show up with everybody's got to earn it. Uh CEV didn't do anything to back up. Uh, he hadn't done anything to back up. Uh, but Tate. But but Tate's done everything to move forward. You know, he had he there was a bunch of guys kind of battling for that second spot, and you know, he he he cleared that and he came out of that smoke first, you know, with that group. And so now you know, he's got a big summer and he's just gonna keep getting better. Uh. But you know, I don't think CV is gonna gonna go backwards. So be a great competitive summer and fall camp and then you go play games. I mean, that's that's all we got. We don't get we don't get three preseason games. You know, we don't get any of that stuff. So we got all we can do is evaluate based on practice. And but I'm very encouraged by the by the room, not just those two guys by the room, because I think we could use all of those guys and all. You know, those guys could help us win if needed. So we'll see how it all plays out. That's Dabo Sweeney talked about Tate Reynolds, and I you know, when I hear Dabo, I will give him credit for this you know there should be There should be some preseason games in college sports. I mean, there really should be. Even if these preseason games are kind of happening in the midst of your early fall practice. It is very difficult to believe that it's twenty twenty six and we still run guys out there without really having played live against anybody good on good and you could do it at practice, but you can't risk it. One or two fall preseason games would probably do college football a great service. And again, I think you could tie it back to some of these in state schools. You might even can play with some of the clock rules that you had for the Clemson spring game, where you played the first quarter basically just like you normally would, the final two minutes of each quarter just like you normally would, but the rest of the time are running clock. And cut a check to Firman and cut a check to Wafford in those smaller schools in state, and then take them off of the calendar, take them off of the schedule in the regular season. You could charge people to get in, have a couple of extra weeks where you make money for both schools. Heck, I wouldn't even be against Clemson playing at the smaller program. Now, a smaller program would probably say, we'd rather play at Clemson because we want a larger gate, we want more people in there. But I'd be okay with that too, Like, when's the last time Clemson played at Wofford? When's the last time Clemson played at Furman spring? Excuse me? Preseason, fall game. I'm down with it a matter of fact, put up maybe since it's a smaller venue, put a premium on the price, make it, make it a high dollar item, something like that. I don't know anyway, a little bit more from Dabosweeney also talked about the running back room and in his mind, their performance. Here's what coach had to say. Yeah, well, I think I think easy E you know, caught my early on both sides. He played a little bit for both sides. But Gid had a great day. I think Gid was. I don't know what he had. He was maybe close to a hundred yard eighty something yours maybe or so Gid ahead of go day. Yeah there you go. I mean he had a really productive day. Uh, he's had a great spring. You know, he's he's one coming out of it, and you know, CJ's had a great spring as well. He's he's uh gonna need a big summer. He's made some progress, uh, just just with his body since he got here, he's made some improvement. He's really proud of him because. He came back from spring break actually you know, a few pounds even heavier than where he was. So he's he's working his way physically where we need him to be, uh this fall, so he can be a little bit more of an every down type back and not just a situational guy. And that's important to him, you know, he wants to be able to do that. And then and. Then he's he's had a very good spring. You know, he's he's been productive, but I'd like to see him take another step this summer from the passing game standpoint. But man running the football, he's he's a he's a. He's a rolling ball of butcher blades. Man. I mean, he punishes you when you when he runs the football. So they he's just playing with a little more confidence. And then it was good to get Jarvis back. You know, Jarvis hadn't really played live football in quite a while, so he was able to play a little live football and you know, I think by the time we get through the summer and ball camp and end of the season of course of the season, Jarvis will be a guy that will helped this football team. We didn't really have Jay Haynes outside of a green Jersey, so you know, he's still he's still really not in the mix until he can get back out there live. And that could prove to be an interesting guy as well, because you know, when Jay Haynes two years ago the back end of the season was called upon, looked really good. And I always tell this story because I interviewed his high school coach about like, why was he an undervalued prospect? And he said, well, help because his first three years in the program, he was behind two players that went on to play running back collegiately. So he didn't really get a chance to put up huge numbers as a sophomore and a freshman that you know, some other guys get a chance to do. So that's an important aspect of Jay Haynes and maybe a story that might begin to write itself as we get into the season if he can show up on the grid iron for the Tigers as well. All right, quick break, We'll come back we'll put a bow on the Tuesday edition of the show right after this. What have you done for me lately? It's a fair question, just on lisele sight of the bigger picture. Don't forget history. Lucky for us at Clemson, the answer to the questions what have you done for me lately? And what have you done? Always are the same. We win. Final segment on a Tuesday. So I think we may have found the thing that is going to make baseball more enjoyable than it has been in a while. This ABS review system. Have you seen this? So no longer on your television screen are you going to see that box and lets you know if it's a ball or a strike regardless of what the umpire calls that box and that technology is now utilized by MLB for challenges where a player believes that the umpire has missed a call. And so this has turned up in the first week of the season several times, including an ejection and perhaps one of the more electric moments that we saw over the weekend when in a matchup between Cincinnati and Boston, there is a review on C. B. Buckner, who is the umpire twice back to back pitches and listen to the fans when the automatic ball strike system, the ABS says that he was wrong both times. Here we go. Go the looker. Challenge A mediots half of the helmet. The Reds runners. All hold, that's challenging the picture. ABS, power to my team, all ball that take us on, He continues, go at the. Ball, Abs could be a lot of fun. Mark, It's amazing how minuscule the misses are. But these guys are just annoying. Great feel for that strike zone. It was called strike three, end of ending. Now the two two cold, strike three and ten for helmet Again, he says, it's off the play away. Now the's challenge in the picture. Here we go the loudest cheers of the game. The Reds have him to homers. Come up back to their challenges. Oh and what's great is, honestly, it's fantastic to watch the umpire does the whole light because he thinking it's a punch out third strike, bases loaded, only to have the absa it's a ball. Then we did have one ejection this weekend, well the only and I know of where ABS ended up factoring into an ejection of a of a coach three to two pitch Baltimore and in Minnesota facing golf. Eight to six is the score top of the ninth inning. Here's what it looked like. The umpire called it a ball. The picture asked for the review. They call a strike and that was the second out of the inning, I believe, and the Twins coach goes crazy. Trump said a slider that is called ball four. I don't think Adlie. Rutchman challenging all the pictures challenging. Yeah, he played right to his hat with the first picture challenging the first challenge by an orihells picture, and Derek shell Is in sensed he didn't think Hellsley got that off in time. Well, he went right to his hat, came off the mound. And tapped his hat. Last. Diaz is yelling at Derek Sheldon to get back and the runner Keyshaw will be set back to first and Derek Shelton's been thrown outs. He's arguing with the robots, you can't defeat the robots. He's arguing with the robots, you can't defeat the robots. Now. The one thing that I have seen people suggest is if this ABS technology can do this so quickly and the goal is to get the balls and strikes correct. And you don't want to eliminate the umpires making calls, then just tell them in their ear pitch goes down, ball, call the ball, pitch goes down, strike, call strike. He can still call out safe at the plate, and if we want to have a review for that, okay, but all of this review and there's certain rules on it, like how many times you can do it and blah blah blah. But the fans certainly love it, and the players, I'm gonna give them credit because for years they've been getting hosed on some of this stuff, and they've known that ball was low and that ball was away, and now they can say, go to the robot, go to the abs. A little tap of the cap and a little tip of the cap here to Major League Baseball for doing this. I like it. I think they still it's gonna have some improvements, but man, baseball is looking much more entertaining today than it did a year ago. We'll talk about more tomorrow until there as always, y'all take care now and go Tigers. Show notes: Swanny breaks down what Clemson fans can realistically take away from the Tigers’ spring game—and what might just be noise. From the ongoing quarterback battle between Tait Reynolds and Christopher Vizzina to Dabo Swinney’s comments that raise as many questions as answers, there’s plenty to unpack. Plus, a look at major changes within Clemson basketball’s coaching staff, what it means for the program moving forward, and why roster retention—like Zach Foster’s return—could be a bigger storyline than any single hire. It’s a deep dive into spring impressions, roster movement, and the uncertainty surrounding Clemson’s path heading into a pivotal season.