Missed opportunity will haunt Clemson

CLEMSON, S.C. - Maybe one night years from now, Charlie Whitehurst will sleep through one entire night without seeing it in his mind's eye.

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Perhaps in time, the frozen image of a football drifting inches from the tips of his fingers will fade from Chansi Stuckey's consciousness.

Hopefully someday soon, Bobby Williamson will stop doing jumping jacks all alone in the end zone.

If this was a defining moment that got away from the Clemson Tigers, one play in particular will survive hauntingly from Saturday's 36-30 triple-overtime loss to Miami.

Third down just outside the 10-yard line. Twenty-three seconds left in regulation. Three points down. Two players so wide open on opposite sides of the end zone you can hardly believe it.

"I've just got to make one play," said Whitehurst, Clemson's senior quarterback.

The Tigers who came back to beat Texas A&M and Maryland were doing it again to the famous Hurricanes making their debut visit to Death Valley. Here was the chance to finish it and draft something nobody present would forget for generations.

Now they only wish they could.

Whitehurst never saw his tight end, Williamson, standing all alone stage right on the easier angle in the middle of the Tiger paw. He was too rushed to fathom just how wide open Stuckey was cutting stage left toward the "C."

Pass sails incomplete. Jad Dean's field

goal sends it into overtime. Hurricanes survive in the third extra session with a clinching interception.

"It was a hard fought game, and they made one more play than we did," said Whitehurst.

There were plenty of chances to win this game for the Tigers, but it was that one play that will stir up nausea in the film room today and maybe for the rest of their lives.

"You've got to look at it," Stuckey said. "Everybody will kind of be sick when we watch that thing in offense (meetings)."

Whitehurst might have the hardest time shaking it. He wasn't perfect on Saturday, but he was good enough when it counted to drive the Tigers to the brink of a massive opportunity.

It won't be his career longest rush from scrimmage that he'll remember (65 yards) or the 213 consecutive plays going back to last year that his Tigers hadn't turned the ball over until the final play.

It was one little corner lob that will always stand out.

"You try to forget it at least for 15 or 20 minutes until the game is over," he said. "That's one I'll remember. ... Those are the ones that haunt you."

The 'Canes deserved to be haunted. They ultimately walked away all cocky and arrogant and claiming they owned the Death Valley turf. Winning in the end allowed them to disregard just how close they were to being 5-5 all-time in ACC play.

In those closing moments of regulation, however, Miami's defense was reeling. Less than three minutes earlier, the 'Canes still had a 10-point lead. Suddenly they were facing the prospect of starting 0-2 for the first time since Jim Kelly was still in high school (1978).

Clemson stepped to the line with the zone pass play called, and Stuckey was beaming.

"I saw them line up and thought this might be game here," he said.

It should have been. Everybody could see it a lot clearer than the quarterback with the racing heart and a frightening defensive lineman bearing down on him.

"I was protecting the ball, too," Whitehurst said. "It looked wide open but I think when I threw it (Stuckey) probably wasn't. I'm not sure about that."

He'll be sure when he sees the film. It was right there.

"It was one of those plays you practice, but everything's not going to be perfect in a game," said Stuckey. "It's one of those plays that everybody wishes we could get back."

Clemson can't get it back. They never will. In the long term it might ache. In the short term, they can't afford to let it with a rugged Boston College team coming to town and lofty goals still at stake.

"You've got to let that go right now," said Stuckey. "We learned a lot about our team. ... We made a statement out there today that we'll never quit."

Even Whitehurst agreed.

"We've got to forget this thing," Whitehurst said. "I think we're pretty damn good. We could have easily won this game if we play a little better. But there's something special going on and we've got to keep it going."

Clemson might do just that. But they'll always know just how close it came to being a little more special.

Reach Scott Michaux at (706) 823-3219 or scott.michaux@augustachronicle.com.