Myles Murphy On Career Night Against FSU: 'That's Not My Ceiling At All'

Myles Murphy is becoming accustomed to having productive nights on the football field. 

In Clemson's 30-20 win over Florida State on Saturday, the Tigers sixth straight over the Seminoles, the sophomore defensive end had his most productive night yet in a Clemson uniform. At least from a statistical standpoint. 

Murphy recorded a career-high 2.5 sacks in the victory, the most the defensive end has had in a game since the two sacks he registered against Wake Forest last season in his Clemson debut.

However, while the win ranked right up there for Murphy among his all-time favorites to date, he is far from satisfied, saying after the game that there are still areas in which he can work to improve.

"Honestly, it's up there," Murphy said. "But stats or not, that it's not my ceiling at all. There was a lot of things that could I thought I could improve on. Obviously a great night. It does rank up there among my favorite games."

Florida State came into the matchup having won three straight games and had rushed for more than 200 yards in four consecutive games. Jordan Travis had been a huge part of that success over that stretch and the Tigers knew that one of the top priorities had to be keeping the quarterback contained in the pocket.

"He's very shifty," Murphy said. "There was a big emphasis this week to cage the quarterback. Where he wouldn't have much of a running lane to get to escape out of that space. Once he is escaping out of the pocket, he's very dangerous on his feet and that could get the corners to get a little bit nervous and shy away from the coverage. That could lead to open receivers down the field and we did not want that."

As well as the Tigers have played on the defensive side of the ball this season, there have been instances of the unit struggling to get off the field. One example was in the loss to Pitt one week ago, when the Panthers got the ball back with eight minutes to play and never relinquished possession, eventually running out the clock.

Against the Seminoles, the Clemson defense found themselves in a similar situation. With under six minutes remaining, trailing by three, Florida State took possession of the ball, with the Tigers once again needing a stop to give the ball back to the offense. This time, though, they were successful, forcing Travis and the Florida State offense to go three and out. Clemson got the ball back and three plays later, Will Shipley scored the go-ahead touchdown.

"Dabo's always talking about having our backs against the walls," he said. "That we hadn't had our back against the wall no more than tonight. We decided we were gonna have to put our feet in the ground and get as much push as possible in any situation. Whether it was against the pass, the run, play-action, or chasing the quarterback. Like that last possession on defense where we forced the turnover. Whatever the offense did, whether it was good or bad, we could not change our commitment and our aggressiveness on defense, we had to keep going."

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