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Scoring recap: Clemson falls to Texas in CFP opening round

chapel fowler
·6 min read

It’s time for Clemson’s playoff return.

The No. 12 Tigers play a first-round College Football Playoff at No. 5 Texas on Saturday afternoon (4 p.m., TNT) in Austin. The winner advances to play No. 4 Arizona State, the Big 12 champion, in a CFP quarterfinal game at the Peach Bowl on Jan. 1.

The State’s Chapel Fowler is on site in Austin, providing live updates as Clemson and coach Dabo Swinney make their first CFP appearance in four seasons.

Clemson-Texas score right now

— FIRST QUARTER —

Clemson 7, Texas 0: Clemson marches down 12 plays, 75 yards and chew up nearly seven minutes. QB Cade Klubnik finds WR Antonio Williams wide open on a drag route and he runs it in from 22.

Clemson 7, Texas 7: Texas tailback Quintrevion Wisner scores on a 3-yard touchdown run to tie the game. The Longhorns’ drive went 12 plays for 75 yards and lasted 6:10.

— SECOND QUARTER —

Texas 14, Clemson 7: The Longhorns have figured out they just need to run it at Clemson’s defense and that’ll often be enough. Running back Jaydon Blue scores on a 38-yard rush to start off the second quarter. Texas is up to 92 rushing yards.

Texas 21, Clemson 7: Quintrevion Wisner scores again for the Longhorns, this time rushing in largely untouched from 16 yards out. Texas’ drive was 6 plays for 82 yards and lasted 2:57.

Texas 21, Clemson 10: The Tigers get on the board for the first time since their opening drive as Nolan Hauser kicks a 32-yard field goal. The 7-play drive lasted 1:07 and went for 40 yards.

Texas 28, Clemson 10: Quinn Ewers connects with Gunnar Helm for a 19-yard touchdown on a quick (1:05) scoring drive that went 7 plays for 65 yards.

— THIRD QUARTER —

Texas 31, Clemson 10: Bert Auburn’s 22-yard field goal puts Texas up by 21 points with 8:10 left in the third quarter.

Texas 31, Clemson 17: Tailback Jarvis Green scores on a 25-yard touchdown pass from QB Cade Klubnik to cut into the Longhorns’ lead. The 4-play scoring drive went for 55 yards and took 1:05.

— FOURTH QUARTER —

Texas 31, Clemson 24: Cade Klubnik scrambles out and throws a strike to freshman WR T.J. Moore. Moore was wide open in the middle of the end zone. Clemson has scored 14 straight, trails by 7 points with under 12 minutes to play.

Texas 38, Clemson 24: That was quick. Longhorns tailback Jaydon Blue takes it to the house from 77 yards out. The two play drive lasted 51 seconds.

Clemson injury update

According to Clemson, every player listed on Monday’s depth is “expected to be available” to play against Texas. The only major change from the Tigers’ depth chart from the ACC championship game to now was the removal of backup RB Jay Haynes.

Haynes tore his ACL in the league title game against SMU and is out for the rest of the season. He entered the stadium on crutches Saturday.

That personnel report confirms the Tigers didn’t have any unexpected injuries during practice this week and the roster is about as healthy as it can be at this point.

Uniform report

Clemson is wearing orange helmet, white jerseys and orange pants.

Clemson generally only wears orange pants, or, as they call it, “orange britches,” when a championship is at stake. The Tigers are 19-1 in white jerseys and orange pants since 2014, with the only loss coming to Tennessee in the 2022 Orange Bowl.

Final betting line

Texas has jumped to a 13.5-point favorite against Clemson, according to the VegasInsider.com consensus betting line.

The Longhorns had initially opened as a 10.5-point favorite when the CFP bracket was announced. Now, Clemson is facing its worst point spread of the year.

The Tigers were previously a 10.5-point underdog to then-No. 1 Georgia in their season opener. This is only the fourth time in Swinney’s 17-year Clemson coaching career that he’s entered a game as a double-digit underdog.

Peach Bowl awaits

The winner of Saturday’s Clemson-Texas game advances to the Peach Bowl to play No. 4 Arizona State in a CFP quarterfinal game.

That game is set for Jan. 1 (New Year’s Day) at noon on ESPN.

The Sun Devils, like the Tigers, earned an auto-bid by winning their conference championship. ASU beat Iowa State in the Big 12 championship and received the fourth and final first-round bye in the bracket (over Clemson).

The Tigers have already appeared in Atlanta’s Mercedes-Benz Stadium once this year, for a season-opening 34-3 loss to Georgia in the Aflac Kickoff Game.

The winner of the Peach Bowl quarterfinal will play in the Cotton Bowl CFP quarterfinal. Possible opponents are No. 1 Oregon, No. 8 Ohio State and No. 9 Tennessee. The Ducks play the Ohio State/UT winner in the Rose Bowl.

Massive stadium

Everything’s bigger in Texas.

The Longhorns’ Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium seats 100,119 people, which makes it the eighth largest stadium in the country per NCAA.com.

Clemson plays its home games in Memorial Stadium (capacity 81,500), but this will mark the largest crowd and largest stadium the Tigers have played in this year.

Where is Clemson University’s location?

Clemson University is located in the town of Clemson, west of the city of Greenville in the Upstate region of the state of South Carolina. The university, with an enrollment of almost 23,000 undergraduates, is actually larger than the town, which has an estimated population of 17,681, per the U.S. Census Bureau.

College Football Playoff game times, scores

First-round games

Quarterfinals

  • Dec. 31 (Fiesta Bowl): No. 3 Boise State vs. No. 6 Penn State, 7:30 p.m. (ESPN)

  • Jan. 1 (Peach Bowl): No. 4 Arizona State vs. Clemson-Texas winner, 1 p.m. (ESPN)

  • Jan. 1 (Rose Bowl): No. 1 Oregon vs. Tennessee-Ohio State winner 5 p.m. (ESPN)

  • Jan. 1 (Sugar Bowl). No. 2 Georgia vs. Notre Dame, 8:45 p.m. (ESPN)

Clemson vs. Texas game, TV channel today