Note: The following appears in the NC State football gameday program.
Editor’s Note – Last season, Dabo Swinney became the winningest coach in Clemson history when he led the Tigers to a win over Notre Dame. It was his 166th career win, one more than Frank Howard had between 1940-69. In each gameday program this season, Tim Bourret reviews an important victory in Swinney’s head-coaching career. Today, we recall Clemson’s win over Auburn in 2011.
The 2010 season was disappointing in that the Tigers lost seven games, including six by nine points or less. It remains the only losing season in Dabo Swinney’s 15 full seasons as head coach and the one year his Tigers did not win at least nine games.
The 2011 campaign began against Troy, and the Tigers trailed at halftime 16-13. There was some consternation as the Tigers went to the locker room. Clemson came back to win 43-19, but in week two, Clemson led FCS program Wofford by just one point entering the fourth quarter. Clemson won the game 35-27, but it was and still is the closest Clemson has come to losing to an FCS opponent.
In week three, the Tigers were a heavy underdog against defending national champion Auburn, a program that was riding a 17-game winning streak, the longest in Auburn history and the longest active winning streak in the nation. Additionally, Auburn had beaten Clemson 14 straight times dating back to 1951. In many ways, it appeared Swinney’s program was at the crossroads.
While Clemson scored 78 points in the first two games, the jury was still out on first-year Offensive Coordinator Chad Morris, who Swinney had hired after Morris was a college coach and offensive coordinator for just one year at Tulsa.
It appeared the frustration among Clemson fans would continued when Auburn took a 14-0 lead in the first quarter on two long touchdown plays, one a 52-yard run by Michael Dyer, who was a star on Auburn’s 2010 national title squad.
It was still 21-7 in favor of Auburn just six minutes into the second quarter.
At that point, Clemson’s offense, behind sophomore quarterback Tajh Boyd, wide receivers DeAndre Hopkins and Sammy Watkins and tight end Dwayne Allen, took over the game.
From the 5:06 mark of the second quarter to the 0:16 mark of the third quarter, Boyd connected with those three future NFL standouts for four combined touchdowns. Clemson went on a 28-3 run during that 20-minute span and won going away 38-24.
Boyd connected on 30-42 passes for 386 yards and four touchdowns. Watkins hauled in 10 receptions for 155 yards and two touchdowns, Hopkins had seven receptions for 83 yards and a touchdown and Allen totaled seven receptions for 80 yards and a touchdown.
Clemson finished the game with 624 total yards, the most in school history against an SEC foe and just the sixth 600-yard game against any opponent in school history. Clemson controlled the clock for 36:15, totaled 92 offensive plays and accumulated 32 first downs, fourth most in school history at the time.
Additionally, Clemson was 14-18 on third-down conversions, tied for the most third-down conversions in a game in program history, and the 77.8 percent third-down conversion rate was the second highest.
What probably impressed Swinney the most was the way the game ended. Clemson controlled the clock for the last 9:34 of the game on an 18-play drive before taking a knee to end the contest. It was a foreshadowing of the school-record 10:02 drive that Clemson had to end the CFP National Championship Game victory over Alabama at the end of the 2018 season.
While the offense got all the headlines and attention, the defense did its job in the second half, holding Auburn to 150 yards and three points. Jonathan Meeks led the defense with seven tackles, while Coty Sensabaugh had five tackles and an interception.
The Tigers moved into the national polls at No. 21 for the first time since the final poll of the 2009 season. The momentum from that win over Auburn led to wins over No. 11 Florida State and No. 11 Virginia Tech the next two weeks, giving Clemson three wins over top-25 teams in consecutive weeks for the first time in school history.
Swinney’s team went on to finish No. 22 in the AP poll, the first of a current streak of 13 straight seasons with a top-25 finish, the ninth-longest streak in Division I history.
