Offensive Coordinator Garrett Riley Keeping Whole Focus on Clemson Despite Rumors

Despite rumors of a head coaching job elsewhere, Clemson Tigers offensive coordinator Garrett Riley is remaining focused on finishing the job this season.

Clemson is preparing for a Dec. 27 matchup with the Penn State Nittany Lions in the Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl, and while many players have been opting out or injured for the game, the Tigers will be keeping mostly everybody on their coaching staff for now.

Riley has been a top candidate for head coaching jobs over the course of the early offseason, with teams like Coastal Carolina interested in bringing in the Clemson offensive coordinator. However, Riley reassured everybody in his media availability on Wednesday morning that he remained focused on the task at hand.

The task? Finishing with five straight wins to cap off the 2025 season.

“I know there’s decisions to be made and all that stuff big picture-wise, but I’m telling you, I mean, my whole focus is being here, being the best I can for our staff, being the best I can for our players, and giving us the best chance to finish this thing out the way we have been the last few weeks and go cap it off with a great bowl win,” Riley said. “So, that’s 100% the focus.”

Riley also gives a lot of credit to the Clemson coaching staff, including head coach Dabo Swinney, who has made the school an “unbelievable” place to be over the last three seasons.

“I mean, my whole focus is operating here at Clemson,” he said. “I know this is an unbelievable place to work, unbelievable place to live, you know, certainly didn’t have the season that we all wanted, but sometimes that’s sports.”

The former Broyles Award winner joined the Tigers in January of 2023, averaging 29.8 points per game in his first season during Clemson’s 9-4 season. A year later, the offense surged to an average of 34.7 points per game, which was 18th in the country. It also saw the Tigers win the ACC Championship and receive a College Football Playoff appearance.

However, this season, the offense has seen a low 28.7 points per game, the lowest over the course of the last three seasons. Despite this, Riley is focused on finishing strong, looking to send off senior Cade Klubnik on a high note with his offense.

With assistants leaving and opt-outs leaving the coaching staff scrambling to see who will take the starting spots, Riley’s focus is to just win the game and enjoy the final weeks of the season.

“What I would say is just really the focus now is just ‘Hey, let’s go win this game, let’s go have a great bowl experience,’” Riley said, “Certainly excited about the opportunity to go play a program and compete against a program like Penn State, and up in New York, of all places, and have a chance to go compete with our team one last time for this season.”