Centering Wake’s Demond Claiborne

The focal point of the Wake Forest offense is not some state secret. There is no cloak and dagger as to the blueprint. Yes, there is a new head coach, a new starting quarterback, and a new offense for the Demon Deacons. But at the beginning, the middle, and the end of the day, there is running back Demond Claiborne. The one thing that is a constant work in progress is, as football coaches and players love to say, keeping the main thing the main thing. Centering Demond Claiborne is a part of the bigger picture at Wake Forest.

The Player

There is no question as to Claiborne’s skill set. His 1,049 rushing yards last year put him seventh on the all-time single-season record list for Wake Forest. His 11 rushing touchdowns tie him for sixth on the all-time list. And that was playing in an offense that about 25% of the time was “slow-mesh,” which puts the running back into a scrum at hand-off. Finding the open field was rarely easy in those particular sets.

Despite his skills, there were games where he was on the sidelines late in the fourth quarter of close games. Coaches quietly questioned his physical stamina and ability to be a key element on offense late in games. It didn’t stop them from using him as a kick returner on special teams, in addition to the running game assignments. But they whispered anyway.

Claiborne became known to have a somewhat mercurial tone and tenor. His thoughts on his time at Wake could change from one hour to the next depending on who was asking.

What’s New

Claiborne tinkered with the idea of going into the transfer portal. His predecessor at Wake running back, Justice Ellison, spent his final year of college football at Indiana with a certain level of success. His 848 rushing yards for the Hoosiers were a career high. The coaching change at Wake seems to have been transformative for both team and player. New head coach Jake Dickert made it clear that his top priority was keeping Claiborne at Wake. They met the same day as Dickert’s introductory press conference. According to Claiborne, he hit it off with the new coach immediately.

There is no longer any doubt about how Claiborne perceives his role with the team. He is open about his affection for Dickert’s new power spread offense. One of the top priorities of the scheme is to get Claiborne the ball in the open field and let him do the rest. In late January, Dickert said the plan was simple. “That run game is going to be diverse. It’s going to be attacking.”

The Praise

Claiborne and his skill set are not a secret to much of anyone in college football. He has gone from third-team All-ACC last season to no fewer than four pre-season watchlists for awards and was put on the 2025 Athlon Pre-season All-ACC team. He was put on Bruce Feldman’s annual “Freak’s List” that highlights players of particular physical and athletic abilities. Claiborne was 63^rd out of 101 players. It was noted in the section on Claiborne that he can now squat 500 pounds.

As Wake opens the season this week against Kennesaw State, we spoke with Owls head coach Jerry Mack this week. He said Claiborne is an NFL-level player. Mack said he expects to see Claiborne there next season.

His own quarterback added to the praise. This week, Robby Ashford proclaimed of Claiborne, “He’s the best running back in the country. And I’ll stand on that.”