Clemson's football program moved into 1989 having lost the most lettermen in school history (33) and 13 starters from the 1988 team that finished with 10 wins and a Top 10 ranking.
Join Tigerillustrated.com subscribers on The West Zone message board!
The 1988 team had 28 seniors, and the departure of a number of pillars meant Danny Ford's program was undergoing a makeover. But there was still plenty of momentum, still reason to think the Tigers could remain a powerhouse in Ford's 11th season.
ALSO SEE: Danny's Days | Danny's Days II | Danny's Days III | Danny's Days IV | Danny's Days V | Danny's Days VI | Danny's Days VII | Danny's Days VIII | Danny's Days IX | Danny's Days X | Danny's Days XI | Danny's Days XII | Danny's Days XIII | Danny's Days XIV | THE STORY OF UIAGALELEI | THE STORY OF UIAGALELEI - Part 2 | THE STORY OF UIAGALELEI - Part 3 | Clemson signees | Clemson's junior commitments
Ford signed a blockbuster recruiting class, one he called "the most national recruiting class we've had since I've been at Clemson."
The offseason was marked by two tragedies that profoundly affected Ford.
A little more than a week after Ford spontaneously dropped by the office of Joe Morrison in Columbia for an informal chat, Morrison collapsed while playing racquetball and died of a massive heart attack.
In six seasons as South Carolina's head coach, Morrison posed serious challenges to Clemson's Palmetto State supremacy. But the coaches got along well off the field. On their last visit with each other, they drank beer together in Morrison's office as the Gamecocks' coach relayed the pressures of NCAA and administrative scrutiny in the wake of the 1988 steroid scandal.
In 1985, Morrison had undergone surgery for artery blockage. He smoked and drank and didn't listen to friends who urged him to take better care of himself. He was replaced by Sparky Woods, who left Appalachian State to take the Gamecocks' post.
In May, Ford lost a much closer friend when former longtime assistant Tom Harper, 56, died in a Savannah hotel room after speaking to an IPTAY gathering. Harper, a 36-year coaching veteran who joined Ford before the national title season of 1981, had ended his coaching career months earlier by accepting a position as an administrative assistant to Ford.
Harper, who was found with a book over his chest in his hotel room, suffered a heart attack. For years he'd refused to take yearly physicals with the other Clemson coaches.
Also in May, Ford began to publicize his festering grievances with his superiors at Clemson. In 1986, first-year university president Max Lennon nixed his idea for a new athletics dormitory. At a gathering of Clemson supporters in Columbia, Ford assailed the administration's plans to sink its money into a new learning center for athletes.
The Gamecocks were on the verge of moving into a plush new dorm, and Ford told supporters he was embarrassed to take recruits to 27-year-old Mauldin Hall. He called this "one of my unhappy moments at Clemson," and he encouraged IPTAY members to make their feelings known to the powers at the school. The State presented Ford's comments to athletics director Bobby Robinson, who said an athletics dorm had been "a dead issue for about two years."
Ford's 1988 recruiting class was highlighted by the signing of an athletic, strong-armed quarterback from Louisiana named Michael Carr, but by the summer of 1989 Carr had been nothing more than a headache for the football staff.
