Clemson’s Dabo Swinney Blasts College Football Officiating in Fiery Rant

While Dabo Swinney isn’t blaming the officials for all of the problems his team has suffered during its disappointing 2025 season, he’s definitely blaming them for some of them.

Clemson head coach Swinney was fined for his intense criticism of officials after a late-game defensive pass interference call that set Duke up for what would be a game-winning touchdown and two-point conversion that handed Swinney and the Tigers their fifth loss of the season.

Despite the fine, Swinney doubled down on his criticism of officials – not by simply reiterating his criticism of the officiating in the Duke game – but by calling for reforms across the whole of college football and even raising the spectre of the gambling and sports fixing crisis that has begun to consume pro and college sports.

“We had a game—I’m not criticizing, I’m not gonna say the game … but there’s a system of accountability, and y’all don’t know anything about it,” Swinney told reporters on Tuesday. “It’s behind a curtain. How dare we have accountability. In the meantime we got gambling issues going on and people are being suspended, all that kind of stuff. Refs are people, too. It ain’t just coaches and players, and if they’re a game, then by God they ought to be a part of the game. And they ought to be part of the accountability, and they ought to be a part of the consequences, not just behind some shadowy curtain. They ought to have to answer for it.”

Swinney revealed that after one particular game this year, he wanted to submit 14 calls to the ACC for review, to show they were blown calls. The rules permitted him to submit only ten. Of the ten he submitted, he believed eight were blown calls. However, the ACC said only five of the penalties were incorrect.

The national champion coach continued, “There’s also absolute flat-out misses with no consequences. … These are game-changing calls. Obviously pass interference, not called that’s takes you off the field. … There’s no public accountability. The system needs to be changed. There needs to be challenge opportunities, and we need full-time officials. If you’re gonna have these types of stakes, needs to be full-time officials.”