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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 28, 2011

Dabo Swinney

THE MODERATOR: We welcome Clemson head coach Gabo Swinney.
COACH SWINNEY: Good to be with you guys again this week. Well, for us, we are getting ready to play another really good football team, and Top-10 team, and this time we're going to go on the road.
You know, this is going to be a game we are going to have to really play very well to have a chance to win. Virginia Tech is, in my opinion, the best team in this league and they have earned that. They have got the best coach in this league and he's earned that.
But you know, it's a great environment to have, and we are going to have to do a great job in managing that environment, taking care of the football and playing just with a lot of discipline and poise.
But looking forward to going on the road and seeing how we perform and finding out a little bit more about our football team.

Q. As you pointed out, as impressive as that victory was last week, the hard part is only starting for you guys and I'm just wondering, I know the schedule is laid out in advance and it's really something that coaches have no control over, but your coastal division opponents are Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech, and North Carolina, FSU, Miami, and Duke, even though you've beaten them, looks like they have got a pretty good inside track as far as scheduling goes to get back in this thing.
COACH SWINNEY: Well, as you said, we don't really have any control over scheduling, and that's hit or miss every year as far as where teams are and how they are doing and you know all that kind of stuff. We just play the with ones that we got and take them one at a time and at the end of the year, somebody is going to be in Charlotte.
Right now we are in the driver's seat and we have just got to continue to stay focused on our business and hopefully when it's all said and done we'll be the ones representing this division. But it's way too early to be worried about that. We have got a lot of work to do the rest of the way.

Q. How much progress did you see specifically from the defense in that Florida State game?
COACH SWINNEY: I thought we made a lot of progress. We didn't have near as many critical errors, missed assignments in that game. We did a much better job with being in our gaps, but the biggest improvement is we tackled better.
We were really poor the first few games so it's good to see us tackle better. We had a couple really key stops with some one-on-one tackles. That was good to see.
And you know, we did a better job in coverage as far as we had had a couple of busts, but we had just turned a couple of guys loose. We still gave up three or four big plays, which is the biggest area of concern where their guy made a play on our guy, and we have got to win more of those matchups.
But I thought we had, you know, really good improvement. We are not even close to what we want to be defensively, but we are making progress and you know, it's still early in the season and they have found a way to make some key plays and we have got to continue to do that.

Q. You've been in an offensive juggernaut so far this season. Does that reflect any changes in your philosophy? I know you've had changes in your overall approach but what are your thoughts about the responsibilities for calling plays and do you leave it entirely to your offensive coordinator? Would you share your philosophy on that? I'd appreciate it.
COACH SWINNEY: It's not been any different since I've been the head coach. I trust both my coordinators. They do a great job and you know, my background is an offensive guy, and from an X&O standpoint, I'm always a little more involved offensively, just because of my background. Most head coaches are that way and whichever side of the ball they came up in.
You know, Chad calls the plays but we talk through things all the time between series, half-time, sometimes during a series. But he has done a tremendous job in running our offense and -- but all of the coaches, everybody has input. We try to have as many eyes on the right things as possible to gather as much information as we can so that he can do a good job calling plays.
The big part on our offense, we have to have good play calls. But the tempo that we want to play at, the execution of the play, the decision making, because sometimes we have two or three things going on in a play so we don't really know what's going to happen. It's a lot of decisions by the quarterback.
So that has been one of the bright spots on our team. Tajh has done a good job of making decisions from an execution standpoint of the play that's been called.

Q. As your background, you say you lean offensively -- I know it can get confusing, but is it hard to bite your tongue once in awhile when things get excited? You said sometimes you do talk about play-calling during a series.
COACH SWINNEY: Oh, no, no, no. We have got -- been doing this a long time and we have got -- first of all, we have great chemistry on our staff. I go back and forth. I'm with the offense during offense, but I'm over on defensive side during defense and trying to keep up.
There's always a flow that you want your play caller to have, and you don't ever want to interrupt that, but sometimes as a head coach there's input that he needs as far as strategy and what we want to do, those type of things. But that's about it. There's not any chaos or anything like that.

Q. Update on where you are with Nuke and maybe Howard and Dawson.
COACH SWINNEY: As I said yesterday, I think all of them were probable at this point. Dawson has been doing some light punting. I think we'll increase that a little bit today. I think we did some light, not full-speed running with Nuke today and we'll push him a little more today. And D.J. looks pretty good. He's going to be put back into practice today, which is good for us, doing everything.
We'll still limit Nuke and Dawson today but again, my anticipation is by six o'clock Saturday night, they are going to be feeling like they are ready to go. So it's getting better each day and just one of those things that takes time.

Q. We know how great Tajh is doing in your offense now, but what was he like in the spring? What was the before picture?
COACH SWINNEY: He was outstanding in the spring. He didn't really have a great spring game and a lot of people tried to make a big deal out of that. But you know, he had 14 really good practices in the spring game. Got to dilute a team, dilute an offensive line, we have 30-some guys on the team now that were not here in the spring, whether it was signings or injuries and all that stuff.
From a knowledge standpoint, I was very pleased with how he picked things up. Tajh really grew as a football player last year. He really did as far as his knowledge of the game, preparation, those type of things.
He started last January in really preparing himself to be not just the starting quarterback but to be a great leader on the team. He set a great example with his daily work ethic and commitment. With Chad coming in here and starting from scratch, I think it was great, because we were able to build it from the ground up.
So he got better all through spring, but then it's what he did after the spring. He went back through all of those and all the installation over and over this summer. He's always throwing a ball. He's always watching tape. That's just who he is, and the challenge was for him to come back a much better player at the beginning of camp than he was at the end of spring, and he did that. And that's why you're seeing him have the success that he's having right now.

Q. In the spring he just doesn't have the same knowledge and grasp of the offense that he does now or he just wasn't --
COACH SWINNEY: Well, nobody did. We were just putting it in. It was brand new. Everybody had to start from scratch with what we were trying to do. He had a really good spring.
When we went back through camp and you have two and a half, three weeks of camp, you're practicing every day, sometimes twice a day. He came in prepared because he had already been exposed to it in the spring and he really prepared and studied this summer and got himself in great shape. You know, really not surprised at all that he's playing well. That's really what we expected.

Q. Your comments on Virginia Tech's defense, Bud Foster looks like he has the defense highly ranked again and also your thoughts of their defensive back, Jayron Hosley.
COACH SWINNEY: Well, they are very well coached. Bud Foster is one of the best in this business and has been for a long time. They do what they do and they are really good at it. The recruits in their system, they know exactly what they want and how they want to do it.
They play extremely hard. They are very physical. They are built to stop the run, and they do a good job of that. I think they have only given up 43 yards rushing right now, which is second in the country and statistically, they are about Top-10 in everything in the nation. So giving up ten points a game. So we have got some serious conflict going on here with their defense and what we want to do offensively. It's a big, big challenge for us.
But No. 24, he's not the best corner. He's certainly one of the best corners in this league. Very dynamic guy. You know, he's not a huge guy but he can hit you, and he's got great coverage skills. Really executes in their system very well. Also a returner for them. Really, really good football player.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks for being with us.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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