Not since 1981 has the winning or losing of a bowl game mattered so much

In the beginning, the link between Dabo Swinney’s 2011 Tigers and Danny Ford’s 1981 national champions seemed to be over-stretched, speculative, and merely convenient.

On the 30th anniversary of the greatest moment in Clemson’s 115-year football playing history, the strongest preseason connection between the two teams – other than Landon Walker and Shaq Anthony’s dads having played for the Orange Bowl champions – was the mirror image of defending national champions Georgia and Auburn visiting Death Valley in week-three of Clemson’s seasons.

The 1981 Tigers muddled through their first two games against non-conference opponents and then in their third game made a statement – both about themselves and to themselves – by throttling Herschel Walker and Vince Dooley’s Bulldogs.

Fast forward to this fall, and the Tigers, coming off a 6-7 season that had a lot of people wondering if Swinney had the right stuff to lead the Clemson program (perhaps some of the same people who wondered the same thing about Ford after a 6-5 season in 1980), did just enough to get by in their first two games against Troy and Wofford.

But in week-three, these Tigers, like those Tigers, made a statement when they roared back from a 14-0 deficit and beat Auburn in a 38-24 runaway, putting a crashing end to the Alabama Tigers’ 17-game unbeaten streak.

The Auburn of 2011 turned out to be a shadow of the perfect Auburn of 2010. But from Clemson’s perspective, it didn’t really matter how the rest of Auburn’s season played out. The Tigers, who seemed to have lost their will to win in the course of their first losing season in a dozen years, stood up, won a big game, and declared that things were going to be different this year.

Five wins later – including back-to-back victories over Florida State and Virginia Tech as follow-up to the win over Auburn - the Tigers stood 8-0 and were ranked an all-time high No. 5 in the BCS Standings.

At that point, the connection between 2011 and 1981 looked to be a little less tenuous.

Unlike the 1981 Tigers, Clemson’s 2011 team was unable to finish what it started.

Yet this January, like that January, finds the Tigers preparing for a trip to the Orange Bowl – the fourth in their history, and the first since Ford’s Tigers completed their climb from an unranked beginning to college football’s pinnacle via a 22-15 victory over Nebraska on Jan. 1, 1982.

Just like 30 years ago, when the Tigers stood at a pivotal juncture with an opportunity to define the direction of the program, today finds Clemson looking at its most intriguing season-ending scenario in three decades.

Historically, Clemson’s football program has been solidly and consistently successful - winning 667 times (and tying 45) out of 1,145 games, for a 59.1 percent winning mark. For more than a century, Clemson has enjoyed a strong upper hand over its in-state rival (winning 61.5 percent of 109 games). During its 58 seasons in the ACC it has won more conference titles than any other school, and for more than the last quarter of a century, the Tigers have made themselves a bowl-game fixture.

But a program doesn’t win a national championship without raising a bar of expectation that demands an equal or even higher level of performance in the future.

For the past 30 years, the Clemson program has failed to reach its own stated, and once achieved, standard of excellence. It has rarely, in fact, even knocked on the door.

Swinney has declared his intention to change that, and to keep Clemson not only at the forefront of the ACC, but solidly and consistently in the national championship conversation.

The first eight games of the 2011 season provided a glimpse of what Swinney has in mind. It was pretty heady stuff for Clemson fans, checking in on rankings and computer ratings after each victory, while playing a tantalizing game of ‘what if’ in regard to Clemson’s possible routes to the BCS championship game.

The Tigers aren’t there yet. But when they shrugged off their late-season malaise and romped over third-ranked Virginia Tech in the ACC championship game, they brought down a rain of oranges for the first time in 30 years and gave themselves a chance to show the nation not only how far they’ve come, but to say something about where they intend to go.

Not since 1981 has the winning or losing of a bowl game mattered so much.

Clemson’s return to the Orange Bowl for the first time in 30 years strongly links the school’s football past, present and future, and there are meaningful statements to be made on all three fronts.

It’s a chance to honor the 1981 championship team, and its Orange Bowl Hall of Fame head coach, with a follow-up performance worthy of comparison.

It’s a chance for this year’s team to finish up a job well done and to create momentum going into next season.

And for the future, and for Dabo Swinney’s intention to transform the Clemson program, it’s a chance to take a bold step forward through a rare and hard-earned window of opportunity.

The Tigers believe they belong in places like the Orange Bowl. This is their first chance in 30 years to prove it.