Brent Venables is in Norman, but dominant defense is still in Clemson.
The first 60 minutes of the Wes Goodwin era looked a lot like the last 10 years of the Venables era, as the Tigers stifled Iowa State 20-13 on Wednesday night in the Cheez-It Bowl.
Goodwin’s side of the ball was in the end zone as much as Clemson’s offense, as Mario Goodrich’s pick-6 in the third quarter created cushion that ended up being the difference.
After a tumultuous regular season and an even more disruptive December that saw Dabo Swinney lose both of his coordinators to head-coaching jobs, the Tigers go into the offseason on a comforting note with their 11th consecutive 10-win season secured.
At 2-2 after a Sept. 25 loss at N.C. State, the Tigers went on to win eight of their last nine while closing the season on a six-game winning streak.
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A month after Venables recorded a shutout in Columbia in his final game as Clemson’s defensive coordinator, Goodwin presided over a defensive effort that limited the Cyclones to 270 total yards and just 66 yards on the ground with 14 first downs.
And the defense came up big late when the Tigers’ offense couldn’t play keep-away to end it. After Iowa State drove 63 yards on eight plays for a touchdown to trim the margin to a touchdown, Clemson came up with two stops that must’ve made Venables proud as he watched from afar.
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Clemson’s defensive line owned things and held Iowa State to a punt after Will Spiers pinned the Cyclones at their 3-yard line.
And then Goodrich ended it with Iowa State threatening to move into Clemson territory with the clock ticking below 40 seconds.
On fourth-and-2 from Iowa State’s 36, quarterback Brock Purdy scrambled for first-down yardage but Goodrich jarred the ball loose and it bounced backward.
Purdy managed to recover it, but the ball was at the ISU 37 — a yard short of the first-down markers.
The late defensive flourish, combined with the pick-6 and the overall controlling nature of a defense guided by Goodwin and co-defensive coordinator Mickey Conn, made this an apt summation of a season in which the defense often bailed out the offense and kept this 2021 dip from being a total plummet.
Clemson’s offense looked a lot like it did for much of the season, totaling 315 yards in Brandon Streeter’s first game as offensive coordinator.
The Tigers made several clutch plays in the third quarter on a 16-play, 79-yard touchdown drive capped by a 12-yard touchdown from Will Shipley off a misdirection run.
But the next possession opened with a tipped-ball interception by DJ Uiagalelei deep in Clemson territory, and the defense stopped the bleeding there by holding the Cyclones to zero yards and a field goal that trimmed the margin to 20-6.
After totaling 148 yards on their last drive of the first half and first drive of the second half, the Tigers produced 32 yards on their final four possessions before the final two kneel-downs.
Uiagalelei had 187 passing yards on a 21-of-32 clip. Shipley rushed for 61 yards on 18 carries, and Kobe Pace had 51 yards on 12 carries. Shipley and Pace also combined for 91 receiving yards on nine catches.
Purdy threw for 204 yards on a 23-of-39 clip, but the sequence early in the third quarter that produced Goodrich’s interception — Justin Mascoll tipped the ball into the air, and then Purdy tipped it right to Goodrich — proved fatal.
Clemson’s defensive showing was even more impressive given that the Tigers played most the game without their top two inside linebackers. Baylon Spector missed the game with a hand injury, and James Skalski left in the first half after suffering a foot injury.
Twenty-five days ago, Venables accepted the Oklahoma head-coaching job and not many people knew who Goodwin was.
They do now.
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