Bryant keeps Clemson rolling
Tigers QB sustains winning ways of Watson’s title season.
In whole CLEMSON, S.C. — or part, Auburn may be responsible for half of the four teams currently atop college football’s playoff rankings.
There’s itself, of course, to the surprise of many.
And, thanks to an early-season, recoverable loss, there’s Clemson, to the surprise of only some.
For when Auburn traveled to Memorial Stadium and played unwilling foil to the defending national champion (a 14-6 Clemson victory), it also lit the wick of one most important player.
Before that game, Kelly Bryant had but one start as the successor to Clemson’s sainted Deshaun Watson. That was against Kent State, and as Tigers coach Dabo Swinney put it, “He played flawless, but he wasn’t going to get any credit for that game.”
Ah, but as we now know, Auburn was a different species. It was Clemson’s defense that dominated that day, collecting a season’s worth of sacks (11) in a single game. The untested quarterback thrust into the role of following a program’s most dynamic player maybe ever was more than an asterisk, though. Bryant, 19 for 29 passing, threw for 181 yards and led Clemson with 59 rushing yards.
“Was he going to be able to make plays that you have to make in competitive games like that?” said Swinney, echoing the big question of the moment.
The answer, said the coach: “He made some bigtime throws in that Auburn game. Because of that, his confidence started to take off.
“There’s no greater teacher than experience, especially a good experience. That’s what came from the Auburn game. He thought, ‘You know what, I can do this.’ He kind of took it from there.”
“That was a big moment for me just to see it all come together for us as an offense,” Bryant said earlier this week. “Just to be able to sit back and watch the film, and know, OK, I did that; I can overcome this; I know what I can do; let’s go showcase it every Saturday.”
Bryant has been knocked around a bit since Game 2. He always would be found wanting by those who hold the two-time Heisman finalist Watson as the standard. He sustained a concussion in the first half against Syracuse, which perhaps not coincidentally turned out to be Clemson’s only loss to date. To bottom-line it, however, his team is 11-1 and no Tigers first-year starting quarterback has accumulated so many victories. No, not even dear Watson, who most recently took the Tigers to consecutive national championship games, winning it on his second attempt.
Beat Miami on today in the ACC Championship, and Bryant will return the Tigers to the playoffs, as the top seed of the four finalists.
Not shabby for a bloke who had spent a couple seasons understudying Watson and was commonly perceived as a player just killing time taking snaps until a better position came along.
All Clemson knew coming into this season was that someone was going to have to step in for Watson, not the most enviable task.
The tall, sturdy junior from Calhoun Falls, S.C. was the pretzel in the snack mix, not the option you naturally reach for first. The Tigers had in waiting other highly-touted prospects in redshirt freshman Zerrick Cooper and five-star true freshman Hunter Johnson. So varied were the athletic gifts of the 6-foot-4, 220-pound Bryant that people kept envisioning him at other jobs, like running back, safety or receiver, like cousin Martavis Bryant, lately of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
“For the most part, everybody had him moving positions,” Swinney said. “Well, he didn’t quite get that memo.”
Bryant just kept showing up and showing off an irresistible skill set. And before you know it, he became one of those stories of perseverance and self-belief that football so treasures.
Watson always would be prominent in the background. In some ways, that can be a very good thing, as when Watson enthusiastically and prematurely tweeted earlier this season that Bryant was going to be better than he ever was. Just trying to open the valve on the pressure cooker a little. The two have stayed in semi-constant contact. With the Houston Texans, Watson is now recovering from knee surgery.
The shadow cast by his predecessor could be a total eclipse if Bryant allowed. So, his coach gave him the talk.
“Early on, right at the beginning of spring, it was the first time for him to be the guy and have to go out there and assert himself that way. That was a little different for him,” Swinney said. “Finally, I just told him, listen, I didn’t recruit you to be Deshaun Watson. I recruited you to be Kelly Bryant. That’s why we recruited you and offered you a scholarship because we felt like you had a skill set to be a great quarterback here and help us build a great offense. Don’t worry about anything else. I think he’s really embraced that.”