Monday Insider

We’ve been asked how the latest news – Dabo Swinney announced four players returning for their senior seasons Saturday, including linebacker Kendall Joseph and corner Mark Fields’ decisions to return – impacts Clemson’s recruiting numbers as it closes this class heading into the Feb. 7 National Signing Day.

By our math, any scholarship additions from here on out will have to be accounted for by attrition before the player would report in the summer.

In other words, there are 70 scholarship players accounted for to go with 15 signees.

While that prompts questions on remaining spots in this class, the bottom line is we don’t think the latest comings and goings change Clemson’s direction to any substantial degree.

Still going after the same positions and prospects.

Swinney makes the call on each and every take.

You’d be hard-pressed to find a school that doesn’t experience departures between now and August.

For example, we don’t know if any spring graduates might plan to call it a career or transfer as a graduate to use their final year of eligibility elsewhere. Usually those decisions are disclosed later, and sometimes they might not come until after spring practice brings further clarity to their situations.

As the saying goes, the numbers always work out.

Here’s a number we do believe important: 22.

That’s the figure for scholarships set to come off the books after next season.

There’s the foundational number when you begin charting Clemson’s projected class size for the 2019 haul.

Folks keep looking for spots to open in this class, but they fail to recognize that odds are they would come from that pool.

Attrition will open more for that class, too; several post-2019 expirings could be done before their eligibility runs out, too.

But it’s important to remember that the more you give away now, the fewer you probably have for this big class everyone’s been anticipating for awhile.

2. The bulk of the weekend high school recruiting developments came from prospects taking official visits elsewhere.

In our eye, the most important one to monitor was Snellville (Ga.) Brookwood four-star Matthew Hill.

Hill (6-1, 185), ranked No. 154 nationally by Rivals.com, was brought in by Auburn in an attempt to go ahead and shut things down if possible.

He committed to Auburn as a receiver in August. Clemson's staff had flirted with him as a receiver prospect in the spring but pulled the trigger on an offer as a safety in September – a month after his pledge.

Auburn's staff expressed confidence in the strength of his commitment despite Hill taking a pair of Clemson game visits late in the fall – including one the same weekend of Auburn’s big home clash with Georgia.

Hill then elected not to sign in December, which was conveniently chalked up to a desire to take official visits and enjoy the process.

Only there was just one other school slated to get an official: Clemson.

Hill snuck out Sunday and eschewed interviews with the assembled Auburn media corps … which is a very Hill thing to do. He doesn’t talk much unless he has to.

Auburn's staff no doubt pushed the receiver card, and we believe its efforts were steered toward making up ground in making Hill and his family feel as welcomed as they did at Clemson.