Clemson's team mood this week: Reload

Henry said the Tigers are focused solely on Florida St. (Photo courtesy of ACC)

by David Hood - Senior Writer - Thu Nov 12 08:01:03 GMT-04:00 2020

KJ Henry didn’t waste time in taking to Twitter late Saturday to let everyone know his mindset.

The Tigers had just walked off the field following a painful loss to Notre Dame in double overtime, and before Henry took off his pads and uniform, he grabbed his phone and tweeted out, “To GOD be the GLORY.”

His message was simple: The loss hurts, but there are bigger things going on in the world. The other message Henry wanted to convey? Don’t count out these Tigers. Not yet.

“We all take losses differently, and what was in my heart was that God is still the one to praise,” Henry said. “I think that is a moment I wanted to share with the world. Being a part of such a successful program, the fans and ourselves felt like the world was over. But in the middle of a world pandemic, I felt like I would be foolish to think that.

“There are worse things going on in the world than a Clemson loss. That is something we would never want and we are going to work to fix, but at the same time, it was a message I wanted to put out there to get a grasp of the bigger picture. We will be ok, and we learned a lot from our game last weekend, so now it's time to get better from it and learn from it and grow from it. That is what I felt in my heart.”

Henry said he feels like the team is in a good spot mentally. The Tigers are off this weekend and then head to Florida State on Nov. 21st.

“I think the overall mood of the team is 'reload,'" Henry said. "It's definitely a band-aid that was hard to rip off, but win or lose it is rearview mirror mindset we have here,” he said. “And we have a lot of respect for the opponent that is coming up in Florida State We have to start preparing for them. They have been playing great football lately, and we have to kind of flip the page, so to speak, and give them the respect they deserve. There is definitely a lot of pain because no one loves losing and it's not something we are used to. But at the same time, we are focused on what's up next.”

The loss means the Tigers have to win out in order to reach the College Football Playoff – or at least it seems that way right now – and Henry said the team knows what’s at stake each week but won't lose sight of the current goal: beat Florida State.

“We are not stuck underground. We know what's at stake and we know the situation around us, but as I said, we don't take anybody lightly,” Henry said. “That is what a lot of people want, is for us to look ahead. But in this house, we are going to respect the next team we play and get ready for that next opponent. That is all that matters right now, and we will get this week to improve ourselves and use it to get better because there are a lot of areas where we can, but we have to get ready for the next one.”