When Clemson cornerbacks Chris Chancellor or Crezdon Butler see the ball coming towards them, they think of only three words – “It is mine.”
“Our motto is – it is not a PBU, it is a pick,”
Chancellor said. “That’s what we go by. Anytime a ball is the air, we always believe we will come down with it.”
So far, the two have come down with two interceptions apiece, one behind team captain Michael Hamlin’s three. Hamlin collected all of his picks in one game, while Chancellor and Butler have grabbed one in each of the 20th-ranked Tigers last two wins over N.C. State and S.C. State.
“It is experience,”
Chancellor said. “I sometimes help him out and tell him something that he can do better, and he will sometimes help me out and tell me what I can do better.”
“We just go out there and play with each other. We are so used to playing with each other. Just playing around him, a veteran guy, it just brings a lot to the table.”
Thus far, the Clemson secondary has brought eight interceptions to defensive coordinator Vic Koenning’s table – tied for second in the ACC. It’s been the only comfort for the Clemson coach so far this year, as he is having to deal with injuries along the defensive front and inexperience at linebacker.
“They have been playing solid in a lot of respects,”
Koenning said.
Especially his corners. Chancellor has been virtually a shutdown corner, very rarely seeing the ball come to his side, while Butler is making teams pay when they look his way. The junior has 22 tackles to rank fifth on the Clemson team and has two passes broken up to go along with his two picks.
He even won the team’s big hit award for the N.C. State game.
“There is still room for improvement,”
Butler said. “My confidence has shot up a lot. I’m trying to make plays and be around the ball as much as I can. If you have experience then you should just be able to get out there and play and have fun.”
“It has sort of been like high school.”
Koenning agrees that Butler still has a lot of work do to, but he will be the first to tell anyone that he is getting a lot from both of his corners, despite sometimes having to leave them out on an island all alone.
“The N.C. State game and this last game, they were one-on-one on the outside and they did a good job staying over the top and did a good job competing on some of the short throws,”
he said. “Right now we are putting a lot of stress on those guys in certain situations, and until we can’t get away with helping them a little bit, that’s what we have to do.”
The Tigers (3-1, 1-0 ACC) will have even more stress Saturday, when they go up against Maryland’s Darrius Heyward-Bey. The Terps’ go-to guy is averaging 20.8 yards a catch and has scored three touchdowns, including a 27-yard scoring pass in last week’s 51-24 over Eastern Michigan.
“That’s the receiver according to scouts and (the media) that’s the best receiver in the conference the last two years,”
Koenning said. “We have known about him, and he has been a dominant-type player.”
Chancellor says covering Heyward-Bey is a challenge they look forward to because it will be an opportunity to see where they are in terms of maturity and how they stand against a guy who will more than likely be playing on Sundays next year.
“It will lets us know where our secondary stands,”
Chancellor said. “He is a future first-round pick. If we can go out there and lock him down, then that would really let us know we are no joke.”
“He is a pretty fast guy. He can separate from opponents and go up and get the ball. He puts himself in the right places to makes plays.”
But so do Chancellor and Butler, and the entire secondary for that matter.
“It starts up front, but basically us being the veteran secondary, we put the chips on our shoulders to go out there and make these guys right. If we mess up back there and make a mistake, it is six points. That’s not what we want.”
