Oct. 20—After lopsided losses to both Miami and LSU, even the most diehard Clemson fans would not have given the Tigers much of a chance to make it to the ACC Championship game, let alone earn a spot in the College Football Playoffs.
But there's a lot of football left to be played between now and the second week in December when such decisions will be made.
Clemson coach Dabo Swinney called Saturday's 37-0 win over FCS Charleston Southern the Tigers "best game" of the season.
"I think we made a big improvement today on doing the routine things better, but we got to take another step," Swinney told the media following the game. "There were still some missed opportunities and some plays that we need to make."
For the most part, the Tigers looked crisp on both sides of the ball against an overmatched opponent.
And here's where the real fun starts.
Clemson is 4-2 overall and 2-1 in ACC play.
The Tigers have, in order, Virginia Tech, Florida State, Syracuse, Georgia Tech and Duke left on their ACC portion of the schedule. They face South Carolina in the final game of the regular season.
Remember Clemson is one of a handful of teams — Boston College, Florida State, Georgia Tech and North Carolina being the others — that will play only eight conference games this season, while the rest of the league will play nine ACC games.
Currently, the Tigers are tied for second in the ACC with Wake Forest, SMU and North Carolina — each with one loss. They won't play either Wake Forest or SMU and have the tiebreaker against UNC after beating the Tar Heels 28-20 earlier in the season.
The remaining five teams on the Tigers' ACC schedule are a combined 16-16 overall and 5-13 in the ACC. Only Duke (4-2) and Virginia Tech (5-2) have winning records. Clemson plays Florida State and Duke on the road.
If the Tigers can run the table, they'd finish either 10-2 or 9-3 depending on how they fare against the Gamecocks in the regular season finale at Death Valley, where the Gamecocks have won the last two games in the series.
One has to figure that Miami is a lock for one spot in Charlotte for the ACC Championship game with Wake, SMU and the Tigers the favorites for the second slot.
What will be interesting to see is what league officials do if Clemson has the same league record as Wake Forest and SMU at the end of the season. SMU and Wake Forest do play each other (Nov. 14), so that should eliminate one of those programs.
Back in July, the ACC announced a new football championship tiebreaker policy for the 2026 season as the league transitions to a nine-game conference schedule.
The new ACC tiebreaker systems will be more subjective than objective under their three principles:
—Head-to-head results will always matter most.
—No team will be overly rewarded or penalized based on the number of conference games it played.
—When head-to-head competition cannot separate tied teams, the team with the strongest overall body of work will earn the opportunity to compete for the ACC Championship and the conference's automatic qualifier to the College Football Playoff.
The revised policy was approved following a comprehensive review by the ACC's athletic directors. The evaluation included more than 10,000 simulated season outcomes to ensure the model fairly addressed a wide range of championship scenarios.
Still, the "body of work" isn't really defined, so the final decision will be made by the league officials, and that could very easily come down to which program puts the most bodies in Bank of America Stadium and/or eyeballs on TV.
Clemson should have the advantage in both of those categories.
If Clemson can make it to the ACC Championship and give Miami a competitive game, they'd be in the mix for one of the 12 spots in the College Football Playoff.
Of course, none of that will matter if the Tigers can't win this Saturday night against a revitalized Virginia Tech program.
Reach Andrew Miller at 843-937-5599. Follow him on X @APMILLER_PandC