W2WF: Clemson

No conference dominated the Bowl Championship Series era quite like the SEC. Five schools claimed 11 national championship game appearances. Its nine victories were two more than any other conference combined, and from 2006-2012, the conference claimed every title. In 2011, two teams from the same conference played each other for the only time, with No. 2 Alabama avenging an earlier-season loss to No. 1 LSU.

That meant there was no way of knowing that, at its surface, the 2014 National Championship game would represent the end of the SEC's dominant era. Auburn qualified for the BCS title game that year in the final season before the College Football Playoff. But the Tigers lost to Florida State, 34-31, giving the ACC its first National Championship since 1999.

FSU's win opened the door for the next true national power to bust out from the ACC, and when it did, the party crasher found itself wearing the purple and orange of the Clemson Tigers.

Boston College heads to Death Valley this weekend to compete with the resident "big dog in the yard." Clemson is the defending National Champions, a two-time national finalist who dethroned the Alabama team that beat them in 2016. They have loads of talent steered by one of football's best coaching minds in Dabo Swinney. Now 3-0 after last week's dominant win over No. 14 Louisville, they haven't missed a beat in satisfying their legions of fans.

"We're heading down to play Clemson," head coach Steve Addazio said. "(It's an) unbelievable venue (and) a great football team. I just have so much respect for Dabo and what he's done down there to build his program and that brand. When you put the tape on, this is an unbelievable football team with great fundamentals. (They) play with energy, play with passion, schematically well put together in all three phases. This will be a really, really challenging football game."

Few teams master home field advantage like Clemson. No player on the roster lost more than twice throughout his entire career. In 2013, the No. 3 Tigers lost to a Florida State team, 51-14, that won the National Championship, and last season, Pittsburgh won a 43-42 heart stopper in November.

Playing a team like Clemson is what every player dreams about. It's a unique only happening when a team competes in a conference like the ACC. Success commands respect, and the Tigers deserve every bit owed to them. Because they're so good, they represent the kind of victory that can define a program. Like "Hail Flutie," "David Gordon's Kick," "Thursday Night at Lane Stadium" and others, it lives on forever.

"I don't think there's any question," Addazio said this week. "You always want to go out and match up and play some of the best talent and best teams in the country and best players in the country. I think anybody that's a competitor wants to do that. It doesn't mean you don't have a tremendous amount of respect. It doesn't mean that you don't recognize great, great teams. But you as a competitor want to go against and face and have the opportunity to compete against and defeat a team that's as talented as good. That's what competitors do."

Ric Flair's famed expression always said, "To be the man, you gotta beat the man." Clemson, unequivocally, is the very best college football offers for competition. It's a mountain to climb that has an immortal summit. Ascending that summit, however, is as hard as it gets.

Here's what to watch for as the Eagles prepare for their game against Clemson.

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Key Storylines

There's explosive, and then there's Clemson.

"Good" wouldn't adequately describe just how talented and explosive Clemson really is. In a 47-21 victory over Louisville last week, the Tigers evenly balanced 613 yards between both rushing and passing prongs of their offense.

Kelly Bryant went 22-for-32 passing for 316 yards and a touchdown, while Travis Etienne and Tavien Feaster combined for 200 yards rushing on 16 carries. Etienne and Adam Choice both averaged over 10 yards per carry, scoring one touchdown apiece.

"As we all know, (they're) extremely explosive," Addazio said. "They've got playmakers all over the field. I think they quarterback, Kelly Bryant, is a very athletic guy. He runs the ball well (and) reminds me of how Tyler Murphy used to run the ball. (He) throws the ball well. Their running backs are very, very productive, good players. (Their) wide receivers catch everything in the air. They have a really good, solid offensive line that I think is outstanding."

Stopping the Clemson offense requires attention to every detail at every position. Individual players are elite, but the Tigers are explosiveness comes from their cohesion. Bryant, for example, went 6-for-9 on third downs against Louisville and is 12-for-16 in his last two games. He also completed seven passes to receivers like Ray-Ray McCloud. Combining those two equals 115 yards and a 79-yard touchdown.

That said, there is a way to defeat this team, and the answer might be in the Eagles' past schemes. Despite last year's result, the Eagles always seem to hang tight with the Tigers. In 2015, Clemson only led 17-10 at halftime, and in the three years prior, BC never lost by more than two scores. Those games might present some clues since the Tigers play largely the same system they used with both Tajh Boyd and Deshaun Watson at quarterback.

"They present a lot of problems as far as just schematically how you have to fit things up," Clemson head coach Dabo Swinney said. "You don't have a lot of room for error because they are going to force the issue in how they run the ball."

Do your job.

Heading into Clemson, the spotlight will intensify on Boston College's defensive execution. After surrendering record-breaking numbers to Notre Dame, the storyline shifts into how the Eagles will fix the issues that arose last week.

"What happened in the fourth quarter happened in the first quarter," Addazio said. "We let up seven run plays that accounted for over 300 yards. No one got beat up or blocked up front. No one got tossed, thrown over their head. When you watch the tape, on seven plays we had a breakdown of someone not being in the right gap or when a play hit the second level, we didn't tackle well in the back end."

Adjusting personnel into the correct grouping and right placement falls directly on the coaches. Having reviewed the game film, they set out this week to compensate for some areas they deemed deficient. Those adjustments are what will make this defense unique since there are little differences from past years. Though they retain the same basic schematic fundamentals, the Eagles needed to change things up with changes in personnel.

The biggest change comes as Davon Jones, a former defensive standout in high school, shifts from running back to linebacker. Jones arrived on campus as a 160-pound safety, then beefed up to 220 pounds as a power running back. In switching to linebacker, the defense gains a player who knows what backs look for in passing and blocking routes while backing up with a safety's awareness.

"That's what we're working on this week to try and sure those things up," Addazio said. "We've got some personnel things that we've got to address. But that's what's happened there. That has not been traditionally what's happened there. We've played some pretty darn good defense over the years. We'll continue to do so. But our consistency factor with stopping those (big) plays has got to be addressed."

There will be other changes throughout the weekend. It might be difficult to identify them, but the goal is always the same - get the defense back where it needs to be in limiting opportunities for an offense.

Next Level Execution

Three games into the season, quarterback Anthony Brown is proving he has raw ACC-level skill, and the offensive line, under intense pressure after the first two games, has the depth and talent to open lanes and protect against strong, talented defenses. There are definite pass catchers who can make plays both with and without the ball.

"(We have to) keep improving, keep getting better," Addazio said. "We have a great attitude. We've played three hard football games. We haven't played one low team. Every team we've played is a quality team. We made great improvement on offense on Saturday (against Notre Dame), corrected some of the issues we had and caught our personnel up to speed. I thought everybody on the offense played better."

But the Notre Dame loss taught the Eagles about the next step in execution. BC learned how a team executes situational football but watched a surging opponent shut them down. When they found their own momentum, the Eagles watched an opposing defense respond. The next stage for the offense then becomes how to respond within those scenarios; when a defense stops it on one play, the focus needs to immediately shift into how to execute on the subsequent snap.

"We attacked downfield a lot," Addazio said. "What happens sometimes is that can put you in second-and-long. That's where you can run amuck a little bit."

Fixing it is as easy as continuing to balance the game plan. Missing downfield is easy to correct if a running back can pick up five yards. A stuffed run is correctable by going into the deeper intermediate play selection. Within that balance, everything comes back to coaching players up and continuing growth.

"My mindset is let's just got and let's develop; let's grow," Addazio said. "Let's get better at that and be excited about the fact that we have some guys that have some top end (talent) and are going to get nothing but better as they get older. And then work on fixing the issues that you have or the things that pop up, some controllable, some not controllable."

On Saturday, BC plays against a Clemson defense statistically rated as one of the best in the nation. The Tigers rank eighth in points allowed and are in the Top 20 individually against the run and the pass. The unit allowed 443 yards last week, including 317 in the air, but it came against the reigning Heisman Trophy winner, Lamar Jackson.

"Guys worked really hard in preparation this offseason," Swinney said. "We had six sacks last week by six different people. So it's not always the same guy. Sometimes it's the D-line and sometimes it's the secondary and sometimes it's the linebacker. I think we've made some quarterbacks have to hold the ball with our (secondary) coverage, which has allowed some guys a little more opportunity to get there and then just being relentless."

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Meteorology 101

It's South Carolina in September, which feels a little bit like a New England July.

Forecasts are calling for temperatures in the mid to high 80s this weekend, with bright sunshine beaming on Clemson on Saturday afternoon. Humidity levels will remain north of 50%, with virtually no wind to speak of for a cooling effect. In other words, it'll feel like Boston did last weekend when everyone asked the question about where the fall weather went.

On the bright side, forecasts last week also called for cloudy and overcast skies, and it wound up being bright and sunny. Maybe that means it's really going to be cold and rainy instead at kickoff.

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Scoreboard Watching

Next week's opponent is Central Michigan, who enters this week with a 2-1 record. The Chippewas lost to Syracuse last week, 41-17, in the Carrier Dome but return home this week to open Mid-American Conference play against Miami University. It's a big game for both teams after they both finished with 6-6 regular season records last year.

Elsewhere, NC State heads to Florida State for an ACC Atlantic Division game, while the world's most intense basketball rivalry, Duke-North Carolina, heads to the Coastal Division gridiron. In other action, Pittsburgh-Georgia Tech gets underway in Atlanta.

FSU's game is their first in over three weeks after Hurricane Irma forced cancellations and postponements. That's also true for Miami, who hosts Toledo in a return to South Florida. Both the Seminoles and the Hurricanes had non-conference games cancelled before their game against each other was moved to October 7.

Louisville and Virginia Tech are both playing Group of Five teams this week, with the Cardinals playing Kent State and the Hokies hosting Old Dominion. Kent State earlier this season lost big to Clemson. Wake Forest, meanwhile, heads to Appalachian State.

Two big road games will happen this weekend when Virginia plays at Boise State on Friday night and Syracuse plays at LSU in the national TV game immediately following BC-Clemson on ESPN2.

And finally, future non-conference opponent Connecticut hosts East Carolina in AAC play.

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Gametime Song/Prediction Time

Journey - Don't Stop Believing

Each game is its own chapter, its own individual story about preparation and execution. In and of itself, one game against one opponent is not indicative of what happens in other games. It stands alone in that regard. The collective season is then made up of these individual chapters, and there are trends and storylines running from one chapter to another.

In the past, no team learned that lesson harder than Clemson. Entering Saturday, there's no question the Tigers have a mindset focused on beating the Eagles. If they want to repeat as national champions, they have to compete just as hard against BC as they did against Alabama. Taking even one week off for a team at that level can be disastrous, so expect the Tigers to bring their best. Like Howard's Rock says, "If you're going to give me 110%, you can rub my rock. If you're not, keep your filthy hands off of it."

"Record-wise, they're 1-2, but you've got to look beyond that," Dabo Swinney said. "They've played a really good Northern Illinois team and beat them - that Northern Illinois team just went to Nebraska and won. They had several turnovers and lost to Wake Forest, but Wake Forest is a good football team (3-0).

"Then they had a very tough Notre Dame game," he continued. "It was a really tight ball game at the end of the third quarter, and it kind of got away in the fourth quarter. But this is a very tough, hard-nosed, physical team. There's a different mindset that you have to bring when you get ready to play Boston College."

Beating a team like Clemson requires near-perfect execution of a near-perfect game plan. There absolutely cannot be major mistakes, and smaller errors on individual plays require immediate correction processed in short order. It's the type of scenario every team, every player wants to compete in. It's the biggest challenge, against the biggest opponent in the biggest arena.

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