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With FSU next, Clemson latest victim of title-game hangovers

 
FILE - In this Nov. 7, 2015, file photo, Florida State head coach Jimbo Fisher, left, and Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney talk before the start of an NCAA college football game in Clemson, S.C. Another Clemson-Florida State matchup in the Top 25, another challenge for Wake Forest?1s tough run defense and a reason to think Duke
can upset Georgia Tech headline Week 9 around the Atlantic Coast Conference. (AP Photo/Richard Shiro, File) NY150
FILE - In this Nov. 7, 2015, file photo, Florida State head coach Jimbo Fisher, left, and Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney talk before the start of an NCAA college football game in Clemson, S.C. Another Clemson-Florida State matchup in the Top 25, another challenge for Wake Forest?1s tough run defense and a reason to think Duke can upset Georgia Tech headline Week 9 around the Atlantic Coast Conference. (AP Photo/Richard Shiro, File) NY150
Published Oct. 28, 2016

With star quarterback Deshaun Watson and seven other starters returning from a 14-1 team, Clemson's offense was expected to be historic this season.

It has not come close. The Tigers' scoring, yards per rush and passer rating are all down from last year's run to the national title game, even if coach Dabo Swinney suggests otherwise.

"Our offense is better than we were last year despite what y'all write," Swinney told reporters this week.

Instead of denying the facts, Swinney should embrace reality. Clemson is just fighting through a post-title game hangover that has become common across college football (outside of Tuscaloosa).

It doesn't mean that his No. 3 Tigers will lose Saturday night at No. 12 Florida State, or that they're not contenders to come to Tampa for the Jan. 9 College Football Playoff title game. But recent history puts Clemson's dip in perspective.

An Ohio State team expected to repeat as champion last year didn't even win its division in the Big Ten. Its opponent for the 2014 national title, Oregon, slipped, too — just as FSU and Auburn did in 2014, and Notre Dame and LSU did after their most recent trips to the national championship game. Seminoles coach Jimbo Fisher said college is no different than the NFL, where the Carolina Panthers are 1-5 a year after reaching the Super Bowl.

"It's just a whole gamut of things," Fisher said.

Some of those things are obvious.

Championship-level players and assistant coaches move on. Oregon finished 9-4 without Heisman Trophy winner Marcus Mariota. After Notre Dame fell to Alabama in January 2013, the Fighting Irish lost six players to the NFL draft and starting quarterback Everett Golson to an academic suspension. A 9-4 season followed.

"If you turn over a lot of players, you have to play inexperienced players," Notre Dame coach Brian Kelly said, "and there's going to be some growing pains."

The players who do return have to deal with new expectations. "There's certainly the psychological side of it … keeping your edge and being hungry in every phase throughout the year," Ducks coach Mark Helfrich said.

Oregon tried to address that by digging back to its recruiting profiles to figure out what motivates each player and how to tap into those traits.

The 'Noles chose a similar tactic with their army of support personnel. Their psychological experts reminded players that they weren't trying to defend a title; they were trying to earn another one. That slight difference was one way to ground players who suddenly become celebrities with more off-field obligations that distract from the goal.

"When they were nobody and no one knew who they were and they were playing their tails off, it's fun," Fisher said. "Now all of a sudden … you don't want to disappoint."

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As the internal pressure rises, the external factors do, too. The inexact science of recruiting makes talent gaps hard to sustain. Opponents spend even more offseason time figuring out how to exploit your weaknesses.

"People mark you," Fisher said.

And the games get closer. The last seven teams (aside from Alabama) to make the title game went 21-3 in contests decided by one score that season. The year after? They played in 40, finishing 29-11, including Clemson's current 4-0 spurt.

Eventually the luck runs out. Consider the statistic based on the literal way the ball bounces: fumbles.

Despite fumbling 25 more times during title-game runs than they did the next year, teams actually lost possession three fewer times. Hangover teams recovered only 48 percent of all fumbles. That's down eight percent from the year before.

Two fluke plays — the kick-six against 'Bama and the prayer at Jordan Hare against Georgia — defined Auburn's 2013 run. The breaks went the other way the next fall; Auburn and its opponents fumbled 39 times in 2014. The Tigers recovered only nine of them.

The lone exception to the rule has been No. 1 Alabama, a dynasty that doesn't seem to be slowing after four championships in seven years.

"What they're doing right now is really tough to do," Fisher said. "There's not many people doing it."

No one is — regardless of what Swinney says.

Contact Matt Baker at mbaker@tampabay.com.