for Clemson quarterback Cade Klubnik came after a Week 9 loss to NC State last year.
The Tigers were 4-4, assured of ending a streak of 12 straight seasons with 10 or more wins, and Klubnik was on the hook for the dynasty’s demise.
At least, that’s how it felt at the time.
Klubnik had been a prized recruit, but his ascendance at Clemson had come in fits and starts — a dizzying debut in mop-up duty, a long-delayed takeover of the offense in a rollicking ACC championship game win, a bowl loss, and now this.
In another era, the roller-coaster ride would’ve been part of the deal. Quarterbacks rarely develop into superstars overnight. It requires, as Clemson coach Dabo Swinney likes to call it, time “in the crock-pot.”
In this era, however, coaches and QBs rarely tolerate the slow simmer, and so the familiar narrative began for Klubnik, too.
“It was tough,” Klubnik told ESPN. “I had a lot of people in my ear after last season asking if I wanted to leave.”
That’s the preferred path these days. Look no further than the 2022 class, for which Klubnik was the crown jewel.
This year’s College Football Playoff will feature four starting QBs from the 2022 class: Klubnik, Penn State’s Drew Allar, SMU’s Kevin Jennings and Boise State’s Maddux Madsen. Georgia’s Gunner Stockton could add his name, depending on the health of starter Carson Beck. But they are the exceptions.
Of the top 30 QB recruits in that class, just four ended the regular season as a starter, and more than two-thirds have transferred. Klubnik and Allar are the clear-cut success stories, and even they’ve been dogged by criticism and setbacks. That they’re still here, on the verge of playoff games, is borderline miraculous.
Klubnik turned down all overtures from the outside. It helped that Clemson ended the 2023 season on a five-game winning streak and that Klubnik had seen marked — if gradual — growth in each outing. But it was more about his relationship with Swinney, about the time in that crock-pot.
“I never had any doubt with Cade,” Swinney said. “If I did, I would’ve gone and taken a big-time portal guy. But I believe in Cade. He’s a worker, he’s gifted, he’s smart. He deserves all the credit because he’s really grown.
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