Holiday Bowl ready to ‘roll out the red carpet’ for Clemson football

Mark Neville laughed when he was asked what would excite him about welcoming Clemson football to the Holiday Bowl next month.

“What wouldn’t?” he told The State.

Neville, the CEO of the San Diego-based bowl, is well aware of the Tigers’ national brand under coach Dabo Swinney — and the rare opportunity ahead of his staff, given that Clemson’s only played two games in California over the past 57 years.

So if the Tigers (8-4) are indeed the ACC representative for the Dec. 27 Holiday Bowl played at Petco Park against a Pac-12 opponent, Neville said “you aren’t going to see anybody out here hanging our heads. … We are going to be doing backflips.”

“Their track record, it speaks for itself,” he said. “They’re one of the most successful programs in college football over these past years. … We don’t see Clemson out here on the West Coast. To be able to provide that opportunity for San Diegans in particular to get to come to a game and — if Clemson is in our game — to see Clemson and the paw print helmets on the field here at Petco Park would be really special.”

According to a review of updated bowl projections, that’s looking like more and more of a reality. By virtue of a late-season four-game winning streak ending with a win over rival South Carolina, Clemson, the reigning ACC champion, has played its way into one of the conference’s upper-tier bowl games after a dismal 4-4 start.

Projections from 247Sports, The Athletic, The Action Network, College Football News, CBS Sports and ESPN all have No. 23 Clemson heading west next month to play in the Holiday Bowl against either No. 20 Oregon State or Southern Cal, two Pac-12 teams who present intriguing matchups.

Nothing will be finalized until Sunday, college football’s designated selection day. But Clemson has been getting connected to the Holiday Bowl for weeks, and The Athletic’s Stewart Mandel said a Clemson-Southern Cal Holiday Bowl matchup was among those he was “most confident” in predicting among a 41-bowl game slate.

There are still a few outliers among bowl projections. USA TODAY has the Tigers playing Tennessee in the Dec. 29 Gator Bowl in Jacksonville, and another ESPN prediction has Clemson against Rutgers in the Dec. 28 Pinstripe Bowl in New York.

Gator Bowl president and CEO Greg McGarity also told The State his bowl would welcome Clemson, though the majority of current Gator Bowl predictions are calling for a North Carolina-Tennessee matchup.

The Tigers had been linked to that bowl earlier this month.

“I think that Clemson football under Dabo’s leadership is one of the true blue bloods in college football,” McGarity said. “What he’s been able to do there during his career is remarkable. And certainly if it worked that way we’d be extremely happy.”

Clemson bowl destination becoming clear

But the Holiday Bowl, at this point, is the safest bet. Played on the baseball field at Petco Park, home of the MLB’s San Diego Padres, it’s one of three ACC bowls along with the Gator Bowl and Pop-Tarts Bowl that fall into the upper tier for selection after the Orange Bowl, which Clemson played in last year as the ACC champion.

Neville said the Holiday Bowl’s selection committee has been meeting weekly this month to evaluate potential schools and will meet three times this week, including on Sunday morning, as it finalizes the matchup.

Among the many factors the bowl will consider are preference from the individual schools in contention to be selected, conference input and bowl television partner input. Clemson, according to a report earlier this week from 247Sports, “prefers the Holiday *or* Gator Bowl” and will submit that preference to the ACC/ESPN.

“There really are 30, 40, 50 different variables that we look at … for example, TV and fan travel,” Neville said. “But it’s not just that either. Obviously, it’s the quality of the team, how the teams played on the field. And brand is big. That’s just one of the many variables that we look at. … We have this crazy knack for putting on really great football games that come down to the wire. Last year was no exception with Oregon and North Carolina.” (The Ducks beat the Tar Heels in a 28-27 thriller.)

Should Clemson face either Oregon State (8-4) or Southern Cal (7-5) in the Holiday Bowl, neither matchup would be lacking on storylines. The Beavers just lost their coach, Jonathan Smith, to Michigan State and they feature former Clemson starting quarterback DJ Uiagalelei at quarterback.

Uiagalelei was 22-6 as a starter across three seasons at Clemson and led the Tigers to the 2022 ACC championship before losing his job to current starter Cade Klubnik. This spring, he went viral for calling Clemson’s offensive scheme “basic,” among other critiques of the program. Swinney took the high road in response.

And Southern Cal has the likely No. 1 overall pick in the NFL Draft in quarterback Caleb Williams, the reigning Heisman Trophy winner, though there’s a high chance Williams opts out of the Trojans’ bowl game if he declares for the draft (which he hasn’t formally done). Southern Cal also has a high-profile coach in Lincoln Riley.

Neville said Clemson holds a certain “mystique” on the West Coast. The Tigers have never played in the Holiday Bowl, and they’ve only played two games in California in six-plus decades: a 1966 road game at Southern Cal and the 2018 College Football Playoff national championship game in Santa Clara (Clemson blew out Alabama for its second national title in three years in that memorable game).

“The reputation of the athletic department officials and Coach Swinney .. they’re very well known to be just wonderful people,” Neville said. “Our RedCoats (volunteers) would look forward to, if they should come to San Diego, being able to roll out the red carpet for them.”

Neville said the Holiday Bowl is “giddy” to put on the event and will announce the teams participating in a Sunday news conference set for 3:30 p.m. ET.

“We can have a pretty darn good matchup that will excite San Diego football fans, no doubt,” he said. “We’re fortunate to be really well supported by our local community. And I’m guessing that when they hear our matchup on Sunday, they’re gonna be pretty darn excited about it.”