For the second straight year, Clemson has lost its season opener. Here's what Tiger head coach Dabo Swinney had to say after losing 34-3 to Georgia on Saturday.
"First of all, congrats to Georgia. It was a good first half. Tough, hard-fought first half. Then they just freaking kicked our tails in the second half. Congrats to them. They're a great team. They've been a great team. They showed in the third and fourth quarter what it looks like."
"Biggest thing, when you get beat like that, that's on the head coach. That's on me, so... That's just complete ownership of just an absolute crap second half. Really disappointed. But I've done it long enough. Sometimes you get your butt kicked, and we did today. That's not what we came here to do. But you got to give Georgia credit. We got to move on, we got to learn from it."
On Georgia quarterback Carson Beck: "Another thing I was worried about was their quarterback. I think he showed. He's a really, really good player. He's incredibly accurate. That's one of my concerns going into the game, was if we let him hold the ball on third-and-long, he'll find 'em. And he did. He made a couple huge plays on third-and-long."
On his approach to the transfer portal: "People are going to say whatever they want to say. It doesn't matter. Doesn't matter what I say. People are going to say whatever they want to say. But we do what's best for Clemson year in and year out. People can say. When you lose like this, they got every right to say whatever they want to say. So say whatever you want to say, write whatever you want to write. That comes with it. It's just part of it."
On how this season opener compares to last year's loss to Duke: "I feel great about our team and the leadership on this team. Again, some people may say, He's just crazy, just got his butt kicked. A loss is a loss. I hate to lose, period, to anybody, anytime, anywhere. I hate to lose. We work too hard. So it hurts. It's going to leave a mark. This will be one I'll never forget, that's for sure. I remember every loss. Unfortunately sometimes you remember those more than some of the others. This is one. This is just a flat-out butt kicking. We just got our tails kicked in for two quarters. I mean, look at the score. You're going, Whoa."
On Georgia: "When you play a team like Georgia, you get exposed. That's what happened in the second half. Again, there's a lot of good things in the first half that we'll see. Then all of a sudden third-and-long, big play, boom, big play. This is a really good team. They're well-coached. Kirby did a great job, has done a great job. They kicked our butt tonight."
On the interception by Georgia's Malaki Starks: "We took care of the ball. Starks, that was a great play. We took a shot on the box fade to Tyler. He made a great football play. Great player. We did a good job with that."
