What the ACC Statstics Say About Clemson's 2025 Season

After Week 9 of college football, the Clemson Tigers head out of their final bye week looking to finish the season on a high.

Clemson is out of contention for the ACC Championship, and therefore, the College Football Playoff, with a 3-4 record. With five games remaining in the season, the Tigers need three wins from the last five games to make a bowl game for the 21st straight season.

It begs the question: what’s been the struggle compared to the rest of the ACC? According to the conference’s statistics, this is where the Tigers have been both good and bad.

Offensively, the struggle to get the run game going has been the main topic of interest, and the statistics reflect that. Clemson is ranked 12th in the conference in rushing yards per game with 116.4 per contest.

The Tigers have only had a rusher of more than 100 yards twice this season, reflecting that struggle. Running back Adam Randall exceeded this number against Troy and Syracuse. Besides that, the search for finding that consistency on the ground continues.

Through the air, Clemson is in the top cohort of passing yards, being fourth in the ACC in yards per contest with 284.3. After strong performances by Cade Klubnik against Syracuse, North Carolina and Boston College, the number has increased as the season goes on.

A strong performance by Christopher Vizzina against SMU, throwing for over 300 yards and three touchdowns, helps reflect that number as well.

The question going forward will be how Clemson succeeds through the air without star receiver Bryant Wesco Jr., who is out for the remainder of the season with a neck injury. Wesco led the team in receptions, receiving yards and touchdowns.

Defensively, defending the run has been successful, being fifth in the ACC with 109.7 rushing yards per game. In his first season as Clemson’s defensive coordinator, Tom Allen has been consistent with stopping the run, but it has shown cracks against teams like Georgia Tech throughout the year.

Through the air, however, the Tigers are in the middle of the pack in eighth with 228.6 yards per game. Similarly to the run game, Clemson hasn’t been perfect throughout the season, with games against Syracuse and SMU showing struggles to get stops through the air.

However, those numbers don’t present the worst numbers in the conference, and even being the best in penalty yards per game (44.1), what has been the issue?

Most likely, complimentary football will reflect that. Often, when the Clemson defense is playing like one of the best in the country, the offense has struggled to get going, and vice versa.

The bookends of the season so far, against LSU and SMU, can reflect that. Against another set of Tigers, Clemson only amassed 10 points on offense, but held LSU to only 17 points. The team was able to get opportunities on the attacking side of the ball, but struggled to convert.

Similarly, against the Mustangs, the Tigers’ offense only scored seven points in the first half, while the team’s defense got stops, forcing field goals and limiting a lot of damage that could have been worse. However, during the second half, Clemson then scored 17 second-half points, while its defense allowed 19 of its own and created a multiple-score game to knock the team out of ACC Championship contention.

Each unit has been in sync with the other, and when they were against North Carolina and Boston College, the games got out of hand early.

That will be the primary focus for Clemson moving forward, similarly to how it has been throughout the year: playing complementary football. If the offense can score points from defensive turnovers, and Allen’s unit can get stops after the offensive coordinator Garrett Riley’s side scores points, the Tigers will give themselves better situations to win games.

Head coach Dabo Swinney and his side will look for this rhythm at home once again, hosting Duke next Saturday and looking for their first home win of the season against a Power Four opponent.