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MVP [546]
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Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 7:26 AM
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We just had a very long thread on this forum regarding Max Lennon’s ouster of Danny Ford and the subsequent failed tenure of Ken Hatfield.
One thing that did not get mentioned was how Tony Rice might have impacted the lost opportunity in the late 1980s when we had those great 10-2 football teams that always seem to lose 2 games they shouldn’t have. They were all national championship potential or at least undefeated potential. They all finished well beating Barry Switzer’s Oklahoma, Joe Paterno’s Penn State, Major Harris’ West Virginia teams.
The recruit that we missed on was the Woodruff quarterback Tony Rice. Rodney Williams was a great quarterback but he was no Tony Rice. 1987, 1988, 1989 would likely have been very different at Clemson been able to successfully recruit Tony Rice to be our quarterback. Add Tony Rice to our roster and yes we probably would have not had those bad losses. With Tony Rice we likely go undefeated at least one year. Notre Dame certainly would not have been a national championship caliber team without him. If Danny had gone undefeated in just one of those late 1980s seasons, it would have been impossible to get rid of him no matter how hard Max Lennon tried.
Tony Rice was a great high school football player at Woodruff and he was a great college option quarterback. He fit Clemson and the offense for Danny Ford perfectly. If Clemson manages to sign him, we’d likely go undefeated and either win a national championship or play for a national championship during one of his years and it would’ve been impossible for Danny Ford to have been muscled out the way he was, despite all of the problems that Danny brought on himself.
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National Champion [7928]
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 8:08 AM
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We recruited Tony Rice heavily, he didn’t want to come to Clemson. My thoughts of Tony Rice end there.
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MVP [546]
TigerPulse: 100%
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 8:47 AM
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You are right. Recruited heavily and did not want to come to Clemson. Took the offer for Notre Dame. Danny Ford was a great recruiter and Tony was the one that got away that could’ve made all the difference. In recruiting, sometimes you just have to get that one extra player that doesn’t want to come to your school. No coincidence that we won national championships with consensus top quarterbacks Deshaun Watson and Trevor Lawrence. Dabo locked each up very early.
1981 to 1984 was another miss with Ira Hillary at Strom Thurmond high school. Danny really wanted him as an option quarterback to follow Homer Jordan. Danny spent an entire day at a hog killing/dressing in Edgefield before Ira informed him that he had already signed with UofSC two weeks earlier - played receiver and went on to the NFL from there.
One more great year for Danny and compromises could’ve been made in late 1989/early 1990.
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Game Changer [1775]
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 9:02 AM
[ in reply to Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football ] |
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Agree 100%.
If a kid does not want to go to Clemson, particularly if he is from SC, move on….
We have lost a lot of SC prospects over the years that want to go to a ‘Big School’
Go Tigers Beat Norte Dame next week (and hope Tony Rice is there…)
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Ultimate Tiger [33274]
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Yes, Danny recruited Rice relentlessly
Oct 29, 2022, 9:23 AM
[ in reply to Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football ] |
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I read about it in The Greenville News a lot as that was my main source of information back then. I remember one big article about Tony Rice and his recruitment and he said something like that Clemson recruited him too much. He said that it seemed like every time he turned around, Danny was there, after school, practice, etc. I've never heard of a player before or since say something like that. Could have just been an excuse. He probably wanted to go out of state.
Old Lou seemed to recruit the area better at other schools than he did when he was at SC. Mid 80s, he got Rickey Foggie to go to Minnesota and Clemson ironically played them in the Independence Bowl after the '85 season. I don't remember if Clemson recruited Foggie a lot or not.
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Orange Immortal [64912]
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Interesting, pretty wild speculation - but we'll never know.***
Oct 29, 2022, 8:28 AM
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Game Day Hero [4352]
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Re: Interesting, pretty wild speculation - but we'll never know.***
Oct 29, 2022, 8:35 AM
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And IF Clemson had kept all the talent in state during Fl. State’s runs, we would have been in national championship talk those years.
But it never happened.
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MVP [546]
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Re: Interesting, pretty wild speculation - but we'll never know.***
Oct 29, 2022, 8:50 AM
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Lawrence Timmons for one. Funny it seems like we had more Division One talent in state 10 to 30 years ago than we do now.
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Orange Blooded [2269]
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Re: Interesting, pretty wild speculation - but we'll never know.***
Oct 29, 2022, 9:41 AM
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Tony Rice didn’t just say we recruited him too much..,
He implied we broke NCAA rules by exceeding the number of allowable contacts ….
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MVP [546]
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Re: Interesting, pretty wild speculation - but we'll never know.***
Oct 29, 2022, 10:54 AM
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Funny accusation coming from an era in college football where the University of Oklahoma actually had one of the Selmon brothers move to the town where Marcus Dupree lived to maintain daily contact.
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Orange Blooded [2588]
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 10:26 AM
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It takes 2 to tango and Lennon was just one of the two.
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MVP [546]
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 29, 2022, 10:35 AM
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One more undefeated season or national championship and the two of them, Lennon and Ford, would have been forced to tango into a compromise.
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Orange Blooded [2182]
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Re: Tony Rice and lost opportunity 1980’s college football
Oct 30, 2022, 2:24 PM
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I was wondering if you couldn’t type the name Tony Rice about 500 more times in your post, the 1,235 times you typed his name out didn’t quite get your point across.
So, you’re saying Clemson would have been better with Tony Rice? I didn’t quite get what you were trying to say.
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Asst Coach [828]
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My understanding is that tony Rice did not qualify
Oct 30, 2022, 3:18 PM
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for Clemson or any other ACC team Some shenanigans by Notre Dame where he was allowed to take the SAT multiple times ...
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Orange Blooded [2182]
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Re: My understanding is that tony Rice did not qualify
Oct 31, 2022, 10:26 AM
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You can take the SAT about as many times as you want. That’s not illegal
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