Dabo learns hard lesson: If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’

Dabo Swinney went scorched earth late last week, decrying the ills of college football and the absurdity of those in charge ignoring the obvious. 

He laid out the most damning of all tampering allegations against Ole Miss. He called out a head coach and player by name. 

“This is about protecting our program,” Swinney said Jan. 23. “This is about college football.”

Meanwhile, two days before the national championship game, Miami athletic director Dan Radakovich stumped for no salary cap in college football. A free, open market. 

On the same day — an incredible coincidence, I know — Duke quarterback Darian Mensah backed out of the second year of a two-year deal with the Blue Devils, and entered the transfer portal.

Guess which program, after having spent more money on one-year quarterback deals than any other in the free player movement era, desperately needs a quarterback for 2026?

I have no idea if Miami tampered with Mensah, and frankly, I don’t care. Because if the NCAA isn’t going to police it, they’re allowing it. 

We’ve officially entered the if you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’ era of college football. 

And that brings us all the way back to Clemson, which hasn’t been the same program since the NCAA flew open the doors to NIL and free player movement in 2021 and left every man for himself.

Clemson has lost 20 games in the five NIL seasons to date — after losing 18 games in the 10 years prior while battling in the high rent district with Alabama, Ohio State and Georgia. A 2025 season of national title expectations ended with a loss to an untethered Penn State team in a meaningless bowl game. 

The half-decade of falling back to the pack has officially hit rock bottom. And now — an incredible coincidence, I know — here come the allegations of tampering against Ole Miss coach Pete Golding. 

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Swinney laid out the allegations like it was next-level stuff, only it’s not. If you want to know why Clemson hasn’t looked like Clemson since getting thumped by Ohio State in the 2020 College Football Playoff semifinals, the answer is simple. 

Clemson isn’t competing at the same, whatever-it-takes level when it comes to player procurement.

Swinney was floored that Golding allegedly kept recruiting linebacker Luke Ferrelli long after Ferrelli left California at the end of the 2025 season and committed to Clemson. Couldn’t believe that Golding, allegedly, was texting Ferrelli in class and trying to get him to flip. 

Wouldn’t you know it, in this Wild, Wild West world of free player movement and cash is king, Ferrelli jumped at the better offer and switched his commitment to Ole Miss. For those scoring at home, it went like this: 

• January 7: Ferrelli commits to Clemson. 
• January 16: Ferrelli re-enters the transfer portal.
• January 22: Ferrelli commits to Ole Miss. 

As much as I’d love to side with Swinney on this, we now have a clear, unobstructed view into Clemson’s regression from the national elite. Everyone knows the rules to this absurd money grab of free player movement, and Clemson refuses to play by them.

And by rules, I mean no rules at all. 

Swinney says Golding spoke to Ferrelli, and that Ole Miss quarterback Trinidad Chambliss and former quarterback Jaxson Dart called Ferrelli. Even alleged Golding sent Ferrelli a photo of a check for $1 million.

Ole Miss pushed the envelope and Clemson didn’t push back — until after the fact. Until after Ferrelli decided to go with the best offer, and leave Clemson with a significant hole in its defense.

Look, there’s nothing pretty or practical about this new era of the game. It’s unseemly and unsettling and has run off far lesser coaches than Swinney. Good men who refuse to get dirty to get better. 

“We have a broken system,” Swinney said. “If there are no consequences for tampering, then we have no rules and we have no governance.”

There hasn’t been rules and governance for five years now, no matter what the NCAA rulebook says. While there’s a bylaw against tampering, if you’re not pushing the envelope at every possible angle while recruiting, you’re left behind. 

There’s a reason Ole Miss, which has never even played in the SEC championship game, was playing in the CFP semifinals while big, bad Clemson was still thawing out from a brutal bowl game in the Bronx. 

Ole Miss is 52-15 in the NIL era, including its first CFP season of 2025. Clemson is 47-20, despite playing in a significantly easier conference.

Ole Miss was 61-61 in the 10 years prior to the advent of NIL and free player movement, and Clemson was 121-18 — with two national titles and six CFP appearances.

One team presses the new recruiting envelope as well as any program in college football. The other sits around and complains about the transfer portal, and how college football isn’t what it once was. 

In the irony of ironies, by exposing Ole Miss for allegedly tampering with a player, Clemson pulled back the curtain on its fall from the national elite. 

If you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’.