Clemson is not a blue blood. Not even close.
Neither is Georgia Tech, Washington, or Colorado.
In this threads and others, various posters (including myself) have pointed out you either need to average top 10 classes leading up to your natty run OR you need to average top 15 classes with a transcendent QB and/or coach ($cam, Watson, mariota, chip kelly). Our route, if we ever make a run to play for a natty is to average a top 15 class for a few ears and land a game changing QB. The difference between us in 2014 and Clemson last year was about 10 spots in the recruiting rankings, which showed towards the end of the year.
Wow, talk about willfully misinterpreting what is being said. I’ve just pointed out the set of circumstances that conspired that allowed such a big upset to happen, and you can’t plan on circumstances like that aligning to give you a chance. It happens, but the better and more effective route to winning is to decrease the talent gap between you and the team you want/need to beat, not plan for internal turmoil on the part of the better team.
And you still haven’t addressed that 2004 lakers roster was basically a fueding shaq and Kobe, a bunch of washed up former stars trying to grab a ring before they retired (Gary Payton, Karl Malone), and older role players past their peaks (rick fox, Horace grant, Byron Russell).
People forget that Auburn team had 22 seniors if I remember correctly. Only 3 got drafted (Newton, Fairley, and Ziemba), but outside of those big 3 they had a crap ton of experience. I think that is many times why a program like ours cycles. Senior leadership is so important, so misses in recruiting are magnified in a developmental program like ours. This year we have the right balance of talent, experience, and good QB play to be an elite team.