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Clemson Won’t Have Trevor Lawrence For Its Showdown With Notre Dame

The Clemson Tigers survived a pesky Boston College squad on Saturday afternoon, taking down the Eagles, 34-28, despite the absence of star quarterback Trevor Lawrence. It was announced earlier this week that Lawrence had tested positive for COVID-19 with mild symptoms, and as a result, he watched the team’s game against Boston College from his couch.

His backup, former five-star recruit DJ Uiagaleli, performed admirably in the win, but a question existed about what the future would hold under center for the Tigers. That’s because Clemson has a date with fourth-ranked Notre Dame in South Bend next week, and while they’re still a very good football team, the drop-off from a youngster in Uiagaleli and the likely No. 1 pick in the 2021 NFL Draft is stark.

Following the game against Boston College, we learned what’s in the cards. Tigers coach Dabo Swinney announced that Lawrence will have to miss the game.

“He’s doing great,” Swinney said, per Andrea Adelson of ESPN. “[He] Zoomed the team last night, [and I] talked to him this morning, feels like he can play today. He’s doing well, but obviously there’s protocol. He will be out in time to play [against Notre Dame], but you have the cardiac part of it.

“You have to ramp back up, even if he feels great, he could probably go play, he’s not allowed to do that simply because of the protocols. They’re put in place to make sure he could return to play safely. You have 10 days, and then you have the cardiac part, so he won’t be able to get through that in time to play next week.”

Uiagaleli had to rally the troops from a fourth quarter deficit on Saturday, but he was pretty solid nonetheless — 30-for-41, 342 yards, three total touchdowns. Still, while his future is quite bright, he’s going to get a test that could determine whether or not the Tigers play for a national championship this season next week in South Bend.

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Busta Rhymes And Anderson .Paak Show Off Some Moves While Performing ‘Yuuuu’ On ‘The Tonight Show’

Busta Rhymes released an album for the first time in nearly eight years, this one being the tenth full-length release of his career. Extinction Level Event 2: The Wrath Of God is a 22-track effort that flaunts features from Rick Ross, Mariah Carey, Kendrick Lamar, Q-Tip, Rakim, Rapsody, and more. In celebration of the new project, the Brooklyn legend took his talents to The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon to perform “Yuuuu” with Anderson .Paak.

Accompanied by Spliff Star, a full band, and a visual screen that displayed some of the lyrics in the song, the trio hit the stage and showed off their two-step dances and other choreographed moves for the performance.

Prior to the new album, Busta found himself in headlines after publicly challenging T.I. to a Verzuz battle. “From one brother that loves you to another brother that knows your level, I’m begging you to step in the ring with me,” he said in an interview with Fat Joe. “I’mma bust your ass. Let me tell you something, we’re gonna do it with grace. Come on, T.I., let’s have fun.” T.I. would decline the challenge citing a “generational gap,” but would later accept a battle with Jeezy.

You can watch Busta and Anderson’s performance in the video above.

Extinction Level Event 2: The Wrath Of God via EMPIRE/The Conglomerate Entertainment. Get it here.

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A psychologist explains Trump’s lack of conscience and warns of what a 2nd term would bring

The president of the United States is not insane—probably. He is not mentally ill—probably. His word salads and boorish, bullying behavior aren’t explained by a psychological disorder that could be treated with medication or therapy—unfortunately.

All signs seem to point to President Trump having a personality disorder, which is actually far, far more troubling. Personality disorders are virtually untreatable, meaning his poor character qualities are baked into who he is. It cannot be altered and will not change.

This is not news to many of us, of course. But it’s an important thing to understand, as the president of the United States continues to hold superspreader events in the middle of an uncontrolled pandemic and as we careen toward the most consequential election of our lifetime.


Elizabeth Mika is one of dozens of psychologists who publicly raised a red flag when Trump first announced his run for the presidency. Reading her essays from pre-election 2016, it’s almost spooky how well she nailed who Trump is, how he operates, why his base loves him, why the GOP pivoted to support him, and why the rest of us are left disturbed and frustrated by both him and his cult-like following. It’s part of the president’s pathology and what happens when someone like him gains power.

“My opinion, based on observations of his behavior, public accounts from his family and associates, and all the information we have about his developmental and relational history, is that he is a malignant narcissist.” Mika tells Upworthy.

“Malignant narcissism is the extreme end of the narcissistic spectrum,” she explains. “It is a condition comprised of psychopathy, sadism, manipulativeness, and paranoia, in addition to narcissism. The term, not found in DSM, was coined by Erich Fromm who considered malignant narcissism the most dangerous form of psychopathology known to humankind. Narcissistic psychopathy may also apply. I use these terms interchangeably, although malignant narcissism encompasses a greater range of clinical manifestations.”

Mika says that there may be other issues present, but the core of who Trump is is based in his “lack of conscience (psychopathy)” and his “unusual ego fragility that manifests in his insatiable need for adulation (narcissism).”

“By the way, this is a character defect and not a mental illness,” Mika adds. “It is fixed (unchangeable), permanent, and incurable. It is who he is. The defect, to be precise, is chiefly his missing conscience, which makes him incapable of empathy, guilt, and shame, unable to experience higher level feelings, and understand and respect higher values. We may not need clinical labels if I understand that this last sentence defines Trump’s character.”

Having grown up in post-WWII Soviet-occupied Poland, Mika has a unique perspective on the president and the threat his narcissistic psychopathy poses to the nation. She has lived in the U.S. since 1987, but Mika says her upbringing sensitized her to authoritarian regimes. “I have noticed that people who grew up in oppressive regimes, as well as victims of narcissistic abuse, were the first to raise alarms about Trump’s presidency.” she says.

One weird feature of the Trump era is that for millions of us, this assessment of Trump might best be summed up as “Well, duh.” His pathology is glaringly, painfully obvious. Even if it’s refreshing to see it laid out so clearly, none of it is surprising. And yet, for millions of others, hearing that the leader of our country is missing a conscience makes no difference. The worse he behaves, the more his base salivates.

Mika has an explanation for that as well.

“There are many people, of course, who don’t see anything wrong with Trump,” she says. “On the contrary, they adore those traits that we see as pathological and believe that they make him a great leader. They elect him because his pathological character traits best suit their agendas, namely the destruction of the existing socio-political structure and their ‘enemies’—typically The Others—whom they blame for their life failures.”

“As I write in ‘Trumpian Victory,’ she continues, “Trumpism is about rage and revenge: rage that stems from aggrieved entitlement, but also from the very real wounds, and the revenge on those who are seen, mostly erroneously, as responsible for those wounds…Malignant politicians will steer people’s anger away from themselves and other responsible parties, and blame it on easy, vulnerable scapegoats—immigrants, refugees, minorities, women, eternal Others.”

In her writings, Mika also talks about “collective narcissism” and “narcissistic collusion” to explain the bond between Trump and his base, who see in him a way to fulfill their own dreams and wishes.

“He makes them promises that he cannot and does not intend to keep, but it does not matter,” she says. “What matters is maintaining the shared illusion of their glory, future prosperity, greatness, and scapegoating The Others for their misery—the last one an absolutely necessary component of the malignantly narcissistic leader’s appeal.”

In “Trumpian Victory”—which she wrote in July of 2016—Mika explained the cult-like qualities that some Trump supporters exhibit:

“Narcissistic leaders and their followers fit together like hand and glove, as their pathological needs become enmeshed, to everyone’s detriment. The leader obtains thousands of mirrors to reflect his glory, an open and ongoing line of narcissistic supply that feeds his insatiable desire for adulation and power, at least for some time; and his followers receive The Ideal to emulate, which, via emotional identification, patches up their inner wounds and makes them feel whole, if only for a while. In this state of heightened narcissistic collusion that suspends reason and conscience, anything, no matter how unrealistic or vile, becomes possible and necessary, including a bloodbath or several.”

Many of us feel like we barely recognize what our society and political life look like in the Trump era. We’ve seen people we thought were smart fall into deep wells of disinformation, we’ve watched norms and institutions and check and balance crumble before our eyes, and we struggle to make sense of it all. Mika explains that this as the predictable path of a pathological president.

“Once these characterologically defective individuals assume power,” she says, “their unaddressed pathology is normalized—because normal people are either hesitant to talk about it and/or don’t see and understand what it happening—gradually taking over and reshaping the entire system (organization, country) according to their primitive, valueless, transactional view of the world and relationships. In pathocracy, truth is erased, norms are destroyed, and propaganda turns reality upside down. When pathocracy is led by a malignantly narcissistic leader, as it is usually the case, the society and its institutions are perverted into vehicles of meeting his primitive needs for power and self-aggrandizement.”

So what does this mean for a second term, if Trump happens to win on Tuesday?

“It would be the end of America as we know it,” Mika says bluntly. “A full blown reign of pathocracy of the kind that we are already seeing at work in the Trumpian unreality fueled by lies, grandiose boasts, rage directed at The Others—immigrants, minorities, political opponents—and wide-ranging incitements of violence, which would become policy as well. Trump’s second term will be oriented toward revenge on his critics, solidifying his power, padding his pockets, and destroying the last remnants of the institutions that stand in his way to absolute power.”

Mika described the psychology of that process in her essay, Tyranny as a Triumph of Narcissism that was published in the book “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump.”

Why have we not seen more focus on the president’s obviously dangerous pathologies? Many psychologists have been reticent to speak publicly due to the “Goldwater Rule,” which says that it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion about a person’s mental health unless they have conducted an examination and been granted proper authorization for such a statement.

“It is a reasonable rule, protecting both patients and psychiatrists,” says Mika, “but it is not set in stone, obviously. And in our situation, where the nation has been beset with the mentally unsound leader, the rule has been viewed more as a gag order, against which many have rebelled anyway.”

“We have a pathological president whose character defect is the defining feature of everything that happens in our political life today, and that includes our botched COVID response that has resulted in so much needless death and suffering,” says Mika. “Pretending that these problems—namely, Trump’s psychopathology—do not exist is an insult to our decency and common sense.”

“Such denial is, however, a predictable mechanism in the spread of pathocracy—the rule of people without a functioning conscience (psychopaths, narcissists, and their ilk),” she adds. “And pathocracy is upon us, which is why silence is not an acceptable response from those who see what has been taking place around us.”

As grim as that may sound, Mika is hopeful about the future.

“One major reason I started to write about Trump and Trumpism in 2016 was to warn that 1. Yes, he would be elected, and 2. Once elected, he would destroy America as we know it. He would not pivot, as some hoped, nor surround himself with good advisors and other such self-serving futile tales passed around during that time.” (Like I said, she nailed him from the get-go.)

“However,” she says, “I am more optimistic now than I was in 2016 when I wrote about what was to come for us under Trump. Those things did come, of course, and the nearest future will be very difficult, but my optimism comes from the belief—knowledge, even—that our developmental trajectory as a species is trending toward realization of higher values. Slowly, and with scary detours, but surely. It is a process of positive disintegration. Our task here, on this planet, is to transform pain and suffering into compassion and love, and this is more clear, to me, now than it was in 2016. Thus the greater optimism, despite the darkness on our horizon.”

“Trump’s presidency is a necessary confrontation with our shadow,” says Mika, “which allows us to see ourselves more truthfully, and thus unleashes the forces needed for healing and transformation. The surge of new voters we are seeing now alone is a sign of the change spurred on by Trumpism.”

We know what we’re looking at. We’ve seen what psychologists warned us about play out, and we see it continuing to play out in Trump’s rhetoric and rallies.

“We have now this opportunity to become aware of the deep psychological processes working in and through us and thus change them,” We can only change things of which we are conscious. This is our chance.

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Donald Trump Jr. used real CDC data to draw an absolutely ridiculous conclusion

In the misinformation age, it’s important to understand that not all misinformation is fake. Some of it fabricated out of thin air, but more often than not, it includes legitimate data that is either misread, misunderstood, or misrepresented.

Such is the case with Donald Trump Jr.’s ridiculous claim on Fox News that COVID-19 deaths are

“These people are truly morons,” Trump Jr. said without a hint of irony, before explaining to Ingraham how we “went through the CDC data” and came to the conclusion that the COVID-19 death number “is almost nothing.” He said, “We’ve gotten control of this thing, we understand how it works, they have the therapeutics to be able to death with this.”

“Look at my Instagram,” he added. “It’s gone to almost nothing.”

Anyone who pays any attention at all to daily death tolls from the virus knows that the idea that deaths are “almost nothing” is simply false on its face. We have regularly had between 500 and 1000 deaths per day for months, and those numbers have begun to climb again in recent weeks. In fact we had over 1000 deaths yesterday, the day he tried to make this claim. So what the hell is Jr. talking about?


We could just brush him off as an idiot and move along, but the problem is there are millions of people who will watch, listen, and believe him. He says his numbers are from the CDC, after all. So let’s take a look at what he shared on his Instagram.

Looking at the first chart he shared of weekly death numbers, we see that deaths spiked, dropped, went back up in the summer, then have tapered off since—but with a huge drop in the past few weeks.

The second chart puts those weekly death numbers up against the weekly case counts. Judging by this chart, it appears that while cases have gone up (because of more testing, according to Jr., which is only very partially true) deaths have plummeted.

So what’s going on here?

The data Jr. is using is the CDC’s weekly provisional death count, not the current recorded death count. And that distinction makes his conclusion 100% wrong.

The CDC provisional death count only counts a death once death certificate paperwork is fully processed. That process can take anywhere from one to eight weeks, which is clearly explained on the CDC website that Jr. got the data from. So the most recent weeks in his chart aren’t up-to-date at all.

There’s even a big blue box at the top of the page that says, “Note: Provisional death counts are based on death certificate data received and coded by the National Center for Health Statistics as of October 30, 2020. Death counts are delayed and may differ from other published sources (see Technical Notes). Counts will be updated periodically.”

In fact, if you look at the numbers posted today for the last two months compared to the numbers in his chart, they’ve all gone up, because more death certificates for those weeks have been processed. That’s how this chart works. The data is incomplete, especially in recent weeks.

So yeah, Jr. is using real CDC data, but he’s drawing completely the wrong conclusion from it.

Now, perhaps that’s a result of not understanding it (which is a problem if you are going on national television as a mouthpiece for the White House during a pandemic). Perhaps it’s a result of neglecting to read the whole web page and just pulling numbers from the chart (which is also a problem if you’re trying to speak authoritatively while calling other people morons). Or perhaps it’s an intentional misrepresentation (which is a problem for obvious reasons, not the least of which is that it could lead to more dead Americans).

While it’s tempting to lean toward Don Jr.’s incompetence, there’s one detail that makes me wonder if it was purposeful. Donald Trump Jr. shared this information on his Instagram, but not on Facebook (at least not that I could find). The reason that’s suspect is that people can’t click on links on Instagram. In fact, if they’re using the mobile app, which is how the vast majority of people use Instagram, you can’t even copy and paste the links, so it’s very difficult to get to the website he cites. On Facebook, the CDC links in his share text would have shown up as clickable links, and maybe—just maybe—some of his readers would bother checking his accuracy for themselves.

People using the provisional death count erroneously isn’t new. I wrote about it several months ago, when a claim kept going around that the CDC had lowered its death count. It hadn’t. People were just confusing the provisional death count numbers with the real-time death count and running with their conspiracy theories.

So when Trump Jr. shares his charts and asks on Instagram, “Why isn’t the ACTUAL data from the CDC being discussed?” he needs to know that it is. This data just isn’t what he thinks it is.

And when he says, “I guess they can’t rule you with fear if they tell you the truth,” I just want to bang my head on my desk and then burn down the entire internet so that we don’t have to be subjected to the Trump family’s misinformation and absurd gaslighting any longer.

Happy voting, everyone.

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Draymond Green Trash Talked Charles Woodson After Michigan State Upset Michigan

The Big Ten saw a gigantic upset on Saturday afternoon. The Michigan State Spartans, fresh off of a loss to Rutgers in which they could not stop the Scarlet Knight offense, took down 13th ranked Michigan in Ann Arbor, 27-24. The Spartans let it fly on offense, throwing for 323 yards and oftentimes drawing penalties against the Wolverine defense, while they were able to bear down and get enough stops on defense.

The game also featured a pretty fun subplot: Draymond Green, who appeared on Fox’s pregame show, watched the game with his Twitter account at the ready, live tweeting the festivities and even calling on the Michigan State offense to attack a member of Michigan’s secondary.

While appearing on the pregame show, Green bantered with Michigan legend Charles Woodson, and made it a point to trash talk the former Heisman Trophy winner. He must have known it would have gone viral, because he also used that tweet as a chance to tell people to go vote.

And from there, Green kept the support for his alma mater going, including taking a special level of joy in anyone who said that Wolverines coach Jim Harbaugh should have been fired for losing to his rival.

Athletes vocally supporting the school they attended (or, in the case of LeBron James and Ohio State, love despite not going there) is nothing new, but Green went full Spartan in getting joy out of prodding Michigan.

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The ‘Community’ Cast Had An Unofficial Reunion To Encourage Humans To Vote For Joe Biden

Remote show reunions have never been more popular these days, as casts of various shows have gotten together virtually in recent months to fundraise or just keep busy and give fans something to occupy their time with while social distancing. The cast of Community, for example, held a fundraiser for World Central Kitchen and Frontline Foods by doing a virtual table read of an episode from the show’s fifth season earlier in the year. But Friday brought a different kind of reunion for most of the cast, an unofficial one that served as encouragement to vote, particularly for Joe Biden.

Several members of the Community cast, including Allison Brie, shared the video on Friday that showed actors like Jim Rash, Joel McHale, Danny Pudi and Ken Jong in what was not officially a Community reunion, but a video where the actors talked about voting. The video was shared with the #HumansForBiden hashtag, which is a gentle nod to the humans mascot of Greendale Community College from the show.

The video was careful not to officially call it a Community reunion, and Pudi at one point employed a fourth wall-breaking habit of his Abed character to talk about what was going on, well, while it was going on.

“We’re all kind of dressed like our characters but nobody’s called anybody by name yet,” Pudi said, later spelling it out for us all directly. “We’re in a commercial for a presidential campaign! That’s why nobody has a name, we had to skirt the studio’s permission!”

As far as Zoom-based sketch concepts go, which are all the rage these days, this one was actually pretty well done. There are some “command W” jokes in there that cause unassuming people (Britta, the Dean) to leave the call and the video actually does play out a bit like an episode of Community: each person is being ridiculous in their own unique way, all finding reasons not to vote.

And then, of course, Jeff brain-warps them all into voting with an oddly selfish message that somehow is convincing enough to wrap things up nicely. For fans of Community, it was nice to see (unofficial) flashes of their characters and the show’s dynamic that made it such a fun watch in the first place. We may have gotten six seasons after all but despite still waiting for a movie, a Zoom call was a nice substitute in the interim.

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Ariana Grande Warns Fans The ‘Spookiest Thing Going On’ This Halloween Is Still A Pandemic

Ariana Grande is currently celebrating the release of her sixth album, Positions, one that arrived with 14 tracks and guest features from Ty Dolla Sign, The Weeknd, and Doja Cat. Based on social media reactions, the majority of fans appear to really enjoy the new project. In the midst of all the praise and support she’s received for Positions, Ariana took a moment to remind fans to stay safe and “stay your asses home” on Halloween night as the coronavirus is spreading at an increased rate across several states in the US.

“Happy best day of the year everyone!” Ariana exclaimed in a post to Instagram. “Please dress up, take photos, get in your pjs and stay your asses home bc the spookiest thing going on tonight is still this massive pandemic.”

She would go on to share a similar message on Twitter, one she posted in agreement with a tweet from Tinashe. “please dress up, take pics, but then get in your pjs and watch some scary movies,” the singer said in her tweet. “going to parties right now is unsafe and absolutely not worth it. please be safe. happy halloween everyone !”

You can view her message in the post above.

Ty Dolla Sign is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

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Madame Tussaud’s In Berlin Has Put Their Trump Wax Figure In The Trash In Case He Doesn’t Win

Not to jinx things, but there’s a chance Donald Trump could lose his second presidential election in a matter of days — or weeks, or months, depending on how long it takes to formally declare a winner. If you’re smart, you’re not sure about anything that could happen after November 3. But there’s one place that’s already going ahead and preparing for his loss: According to Reuters (via The AV Club), the Berlin wing of Madame Toussaud has already put the president’s wax figure in the trash. And this, a mere day after his star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame was once again vandalized.

Trump was a TV star and a debatably (and sometimes not so debatably) successful businessman before he became the most powerful man in the world. So of course he has a likeness in the world’s premiere wax museum. The main Toussaud’s can be found in London, but there are outposts all over the globe. But the one in Germany’s largest city seems to be the most progressive, or at least the most efficient at getting rid of waste.

“Today’s activity is rather of a symbolic character ahead of the elections in the United States,” the museum’s marketing manager, Orkide Yalcindag, told Reuters. “We here at Madame Tussauds Berlin removed Donald Trump’s waxwork as a preparatory measure.”

Granted, the president’s wax figure doesn’t appear to have been deposited in just any old garbage bin. The container itself is affixed with a big sticker that reads “Dump Trump” followed by a poisonous spin on his favorite slogan, “Make America Great Again.” Trump is also surrounded by Twitter print-outs, with phrases like “You’re fired!” and “Fake News!” In pictures, the bin has been placed in front of a Trump Towers building.

Reuters speculates that, because he is technically one of history’s U.S. presidents, he’ll likely be fished out of the garbage and placed next to the likes of Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, whatever the election’s outcome. Till then, enjoy the photo above, of the guy who’s overseen, as of this writing, over 230,000 COVID-19-related deaths, finally getting thrown out.

(Via Reuters and The AV Club)

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Rapsody Takes Aim At Racial Disparities In Her Combative Video For ’12 Problems’

Back in August, Rapsody celebrated the one-year anniversary of her critically acclaimed third album, Eve. While it apparently won’t be a while before Rapsody drops off anything for a future solo project, the rapper did give fans a new song last month with her ominous track, “12 Problems.” The track landed a spot on Roc Nation’s Reprise project, one that also featured Jorja Smith, Ty Dolla Sign, D Smoke, Buddy, and more. More than a month after she gave fans the single, Rapsody returns with a combative video for “12 Problems.”

The visual begins with a young girl dancing in front of a photo shot by photographer Yvette Glasco’s “Don’t Let Go” while Ambre’s “Revolution” plays in the background, a song that also appears on Reprise. After nearly two minutes, Rapsody appears alone at a shooting range where she stands confidently while taking shots at the racial disparities in the world which include police brutality and social injustice.

At this year’s BET Hip-Hop Awards, Rapsody participated in the Political Cypher alongside Flawless Real Talk, Polo G, Chika, and Jack Harlow. At the award show, also went home with a win in the Lyricist Of The Year category.

Check out the “12 Problems” video above. Reprise is out now via Roc Nation. Get it here.

Some artists covered here are Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

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Watch Joe Tessitore Lose His Mind As His Son, John, Goes Under Center To Draw Clemson Offside

Joe Tessitore is back on college football duty for ESPN this season after spending a few years as the voice of Monday Night Football. Tessitore cut his teeth in the college game, where he received praise for his professionalism and ability to make big moments sound a little bigger by taking his calls to a different level. On Saturday afternoon, one such call hit a little bit closer to home during Boston College’s game against No. 1 Clemson.

The Eagles faced a fourth-and-2 deep in Tiger territory. The ball was on the 23-yard line, and with the team up by 11, Boston College thought it’d be fun to try and catch Clemson overzealous. They sent one of their blockers out wide, had their holder go under center, and managed to get the Tiger defense to jump offside.

The catch: The BC holder was John Tessitore, a redshirt sophomore specialist whose last name should be a bit of a giveaway here. Joey Tess, with his usual sense of bravado, made the call as his son managed to get the best team in the nation to jump.

Watching the ESPN stalwart provide a little background info on his son’s football career before college was a nice added touch. One play later, Eagles signal caller Phil Jurkovec dropped back and connected with CJ Lewis, who made one heck of a catch to make the score, 28-10.

Clemson would go on to kick a field goal on the ensuing drive to make the deficit 15 points at halftime, but it’s worth remembering the specialist who made the last BC touchdown of the half possible. Joe Tessitore sure will.