49 - 28 If you’re a Clemson fan, what you witnessed Friday night was a total disaster. Ohio State did whatever they wanted offensively. If they wanted to run they did. If they want to pass this did. Nothing Brent Venables could draw up was slowing down Ohio State. Not only was it a physical mismatch, the Clemson defense was utterly confused for large portions of the game as Buckeye receivers ran wide open all evening.
So what happened?
Clemson recruits well, they are well coached and they are an elite program. They have NFL players like Trevor Lawrence and Travis Etienne on their offense.
There’s a huge deficiency that Brent Venables has been masking with smoke and mirrors the last two years.
Clemson’s back seven on defense doesn’t have much athleticism back there and they are poor in coverage. Against lesser teams it was more subtle. There would be a breakdown in coverage while giving up a big pass play to a Georgia Tech or Wake Forest, but the scores were so lopsided you wouldn’t really notice.
Note Dame torched Clemson through the air the first time they played, but maybe it was because Clemson was missing of their defensive stalwarts. Still in coverage things seemed off.
The Tigers couldn’t hide things against LSU last season, and they couldn’t hide it against a red-hot QB Justin Fields Friday night.
Let’s not forget an offensive line that got man-handled Friday night too, and had it’s issues at times this year. That’s another area where Clemson needs an upgraded. In my opinion that’s a lesser concern than the back seven on defense, but it shouldn’t be ignored either.
If Clemson want to win another national title in the next few years, improvement in the back 7 has to be where it starts.
