I was able to go to practice yesterday when the team hosted the students from the Clemson LIFE program. There are stories and videos all over social media of how it went and giving Dabo a lot of (deserved) credit for a great day for these students. And it was. They rode the Clemson bus with a police escort around the stadium to the Rock and ran off the bus to a cheering crowd to go rub the Rock. There are videos on-line of Dabo leading them down the Hill. Tracy Swinney told me as I was standing there that one of the kids on the bus shouted "this is the greatest day of my life!".
But all that has been documented elsewhere. I wanted to tell of some of the behind the scenes things and give some credit to other members of the Clemson Family that made this a special day. These students were awesome - they were so excited to be at practice. I got to talk to a bunch of them (it would have been impossible not to - their enthusiasm was contagious). I had to laugh - two of the students are boyfriend/girlfriend and they were so sweet (and normal and picking on each other), but the girl told me she had a crush on Stanton Seckinger. He is the screen saver on her phone and she has several pics of them together. Her boyfriend was cool with it. This program means so much - one girl showed me the tattoo on the back of her neck with a tiger paw with the letters L I F E in the paw prints. To be clear, I had nothing to do with any of this, I was just standing there at practice observing.
For starters, there can not be a better First Lady of Clemson Football than Kathleen Swinney. She made sure to get around to every student, hug on them and spend genuine time talking with them. It is never for show - you can see that she really loves these kids and is not doing it for any recognition. She helped one person at practice who was in a wheel chair get out on the field to hear Dabo's wrap up comments to the team. First class.
Next up is President Clements. He is very invested in the Clemson LIFE program and as best as I could tell, he knew the names of everyone of the students. Since I just happened to be standing there, I took a bunch of pictures of him and the kids - both on his phone and on theirs - see, that is the thing - he wanted the pictures also. He told one student "OK - we are going to have a whole collection of these when you graduate". It is one thing to shake a bunch of hands - that never happened - everybody got full on embrace hugs.
Finally, our football team. This was a Wednesday, tough practice with a bunch of punishment sprints tacked on at the end. But our players all came and met with the LIFE students, signed their autograph books and snapped pictures for them until everybody was happy. It is easy to forget the players are just kids too, but they clearly understand the impact they can have and they take that responsibility seriously. They stood there tired and sweaty and treated each person like the special individual that they are.
You know, I read the Gamecock message boards. They love to take shots at the "Clemson Family" and talk about how fake Dabo is. They have no idea what we have or who we are. I am so proud to be a Clemson man.
All-In. Go Tigers.
But all that has been documented elsewhere. I wanted to tell of some of the behind the scenes things and give some credit to other members of the Clemson Family that made this a special day. These students were awesome - they were so excited to be at practice. I got to talk to a bunch of them (it would have been impossible not to - their enthusiasm was contagious). I had to laugh - two of the students are boyfriend/girlfriend and they were so sweet (and normal and picking on each other), but the girl told me she had a crush on Stanton Seckinger. He is the screen saver on her phone and she has several pics of them together. Her boyfriend was cool with it. This program means so much - one girl showed me the tattoo on the back of her neck with a tiger paw with the letters L I F E in the paw prints. To be clear, I had nothing to do with any of this, I was just standing there at practice observing.
For starters, there can not be a better First Lady of Clemson Football than Kathleen Swinney. She made sure to get around to every student, hug on them and spend genuine time talking with them. It is never for show - you can see that she really loves these kids and is not doing it for any recognition. She helped one person at practice who was in a wheel chair get out on the field to hear Dabo's wrap up comments to the team. First class.
Next up is President Clements. He is very invested in the Clemson LIFE program and as best as I could tell, he knew the names of everyone of the students. Since I just happened to be standing there, I took a bunch of pictures of him and the kids - both on his phone and on theirs - see, that is the thing - he wanted the pictures also. He told one student "OK - we are going to have a whole collection of these when you graduate". It is one thing to shake a bunch of hands - that never happened - everybody got full on embrace hugs.
Finally, our football team. This was a Wednesday, tough practice with a bunch of punishment sprints tacked on at the end. But our players all came and met with the LIFE students, signed their autograph books and snapped pictures for them until everybody was happy. It is easy to forget the players are just kids too, but they clearly understand the impact they can have and they take that responsibility seriously. They stood there tired and sweaty and treated each person like the special individual that they are.
You know, I read the Gamecock message boards. They love to take shots at the "Clemson Family" and talk about how fake Dabo is. They have no idea what we have or who we are. I am so proud to be a Clemson man.
All-In. Go Tigers.
