Heading into the 2025 season, Fox Sports’ lead college football analyst Joel Klatt predicted Dabo Swinney and the Clemson Tigers would win the national championship.
A year later, Klatt is reassessing that call.
“What are we doing with Dabo? After your boy, sitting in this chair last year, crowned him as my preseason national champ. How ‘bout that for a pick? What a bonehead. My goodness. Re-think everything about myself. I know that makes some of you happy, others, you don’t care,” Klatt said on the latest episode of The Joel Klatt Show.
During the episode, Klatt evaluated 10 head coaches and the expectations facing them for the upcoming season in his annual “Coaching Pressure Index.”
Clemson entered the 2025 season ranked No. 4 in the preseason AP Poll before finishing with a 7-6 record—the second-worst mark of Swinney’s tenure—despite boasting a roster that produced nine selections in the 2026 NFL Draft.
Swinney, 56, enters his 19th season—and 18th full season—at the helm in Clemson. Klatt placed the veteran head coach in the index category labeled “We like you, but…”.
“Didn’t go well last year,” Klatt said. “Started No. 4 in the preseason. I wasn’t the only one hot on Clemson. They started No. 4. Finished 7-6. Guys, what are we doing? Had all those draft picks. Experienced quarterback. Clemson has not finished in the top 10 since Trevor Lawrence. That was five seasons [ago]. Dabo’s in his 18th full year at Clemson. He’s been heavily criticized for not adapting to the new world of college football. He has slowly come around.”
Klatt added, “I think Clemson fans, at this point, are saying to themselves, ‘We like you, but…’ So, that’s the category he falls into.”
Key Schedule Pressure Points
In analyzing Clemson’s 2026 schedule, Klatt pointed to specific matchups that could heighten expectations, highlighting an Oct. 3 home game against the Miami Hurricanes—who are coming off a national championship game appearance—over a Sept. 5 season opener at LSU.
“There is a huge pressure point for Dabo — Miami in their fifth game,” Klatt said. “Now, they’ve got LSU. It could be LSU. You might be right. But Miami’s in conference, and Clemson has run the ACC. Run it. They have dominated the ACC. Now, it seems like Miami’s conference, and you start to wonder to yourself, ‘What’s the gap? What’s the margin? How wide is it?’”
Klatt emphasized the shift in conference momentum heading into the matchup.
“Is Miami head and shoulders above Clemson? They were a year ago. They were a year ago. Miami’s going to be loaded again. Again. Miami’s going to be fantastic. They [Clemson] open with LSU. That is going to be tough. If that goes poorly and then Miami goes poorly – ‘We like you, but…’ turns into something very different. Very, very different.”
Opposing Coaches on the Index
Swinney was not the only coach on Clemson’s 2026 slate to feature on Klatt’s list. Three opposing head coaches also made the “Coaching Pressure Index”: LSU’s Lane Kiffin, South Carolina’s Shane Beamer, and North Carolina’s Bill Belichick.
Kiffin was categorized under “just happy you’re here,” while both Beamer and Belichick were placed in the “is this going to work?” tier.
