T.J. Parker’s Bold Prediction for Clemson Tigers Defense: ‘It’s Going to be Havoc’

Some buy into preseason talk about being a potential national championship contender, or even a promising prospect on the NFL mock draft board. The Clemson Tigers are hearing a lot of both this year.

But not defensive end T.J. Parker isn’t having it.

“I could care less,” he said on Thursday at ACC Kickoff. “I see it all, and some people take it, and they get comfortable. It motivates me because I don’t like to see predictions that did not happen. I want to go make it happen, whether that is a national championship, I want to try my best to do my part to help this team.”

The Tigers' defensive end has unfinished business following the team’s College Football Playoff loss in the first round to Texas. Combining that with a new defensive coordinator in Tom Allen, Parker believes that he has everything needed to succeed at the position in 2025.

“For him, from day one, it's about passion,” he said. “I need to be coached as hard as possible, and you can get in my face and tell me what it is and tell me what to do, and he's been that way since day one. For me, that builds a lot of confidence in my game, and [I’m] also looking forward. I'm just so happy to have him on the team, and it's going to be a great season.”

Parker said that Allen “demands excellence”, which leads to high hopes that the junior holds about the Clemson defensive line. Joining forces with fellow junior standout Peter Woods, the potential for the group was simple: “All-American.”

“It’s going to be havoc,” Parker said. “Overwhelming everybody. We’ve had that conversation of what we wanted to be coming into this year. We are just looking to bring the whole team up, and get our young guys ready to play, make sure that we have a complete team, and go out there and dominate and execute.”

The junior recorded 11 sacks and 19.5 tackles for a loss, setting a single-season program record for forced fumbles, six, in 2024. Parker isn’t finished just yet, as he plans to build on his historical season.

With Allen working with No. 3-overall pick in this year’s draft, Abdul Carter, at Penn State a season ago, the Clemson standout wants that type of recognition.

“I'm looking forward to having a better season than I did last year,” Parker said. “Obviously, to see Coach Allen have a first-round caliber defensive end, have the season he had, I can see myself recreating something like that, even better, but just being my own person, so I'm super excited about that.”

Clemson has its first home opener since 2019 against a tall opponent in the LSU Tigers. With talks about LSU head coach Brian Kelly and players speaking about “the real Death Valley”, Parker, likewise to his Clemson coaches, is ready to handle the talk on the gridiron.

“We are going to handle all the talk,” he said. “They can have their own opinion, we will handle that [on] Aug. 30. At the end of the day, you can do all the talking, [but] we are going to see.”