CBS Sports Counting Out Clemson in ACC Prediction

The Clemson Tigers will need to overachieve in 2026 to change the media perception of the program. They have the tools to do so.

Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney will have opportunities to make a statement to the college football world in 2026. | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect

Two years removed from their last ACC Championship, the Clemson Tigers will have to gain back the respect of plenty of national analysts in the sport. That includes those with CBS Sports.

When ranking the entire ACC, nobody on the seven-person panel put head coach Dabo Swinney’s program inside the top three of their conference prediction. Of course, everybody ends up putting Miami at the top, fresh off its national championship appearance, but the Tigers will look to change that in 2026.

Three of the analysts have Clemson at fourth, the highest ranking for the program. One of them, John Talty, has the Tigers all the way down at sixth. 

After the Hurricanes, the consensus had the likes of SMU and Louisville ahead of Clemson, while NC State and Cal made surprise entries ahead of the Tigers in some leaderboards. For the first two teams mentioned, Swinney won’t play either the Mustangs nor Cardinals, while they will see Miami on Oct. 3 at Memorial Stadium.

Two of the analysts, Talty and Tom Fornelli, have Clemson as the most overrated program in the conference entering the season as well. Fornelli believes that the program has “lost its place among the elite.”

“If we consider the last three seasons, the ones with not only the transfer portal but also open NIL, to be the modern era of college football, then Clemson is a powerhouse of the past,” he said. 

Many believe that a 10-win season is out of the cards for Swinney and the team this season, and there is a valid argument for so. There’s a two-loss cushion to continue to allow that to happen, but games against LSU and Miami tend to erase that pretty quickly. 

Clemson also has to fend off the likes of previous losses from last season, Georgia Tech, Duke and Syracuse, while facing tough contests like an away game at Cal on a Friday night. There are also other contests where the Tigers could trip up, which we have seen over the last two years. 

However, the preseason outlooks that we’ve seen over the course of the offseason have set the record straight about Clemson football: it will be counted out until the Tigers can prove the world wrong once again. 

Swinney has the recipe, even bringing back his former offensive coordinator, who brought out the offense in previous seasons in Chad Morris, but it will need the buy-in from the players to flip the narrative.

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