Revisiting the 1939-40 football season and Clemson’s first bowl game

The past decade has arguably been the best stretch in Clemson football history.

Since 2011, the Tigers have gone only one season without double-digit wins, which happened in 2023. They’ve made 20 postseasons, but it would’ve been 26 without the self-imposed punishment for its brawl with South Carolina in 2004. Clemson is 13-10 in those bowl games, with four National Championship appearances and two wins.

But when did Clemson’s postseason success start? To find out, we’ll have to jump back in time to the 1939-1940 season.

The Tigers had played 43 seasons before 1939, but before 1934, there were only five bowl games to have ever existed. The most famous of which — and the only one to survive to the present day — is the Rose Bowl. At the height of the Great Depression, bowl games started to take off. In 1934, the Sugar Bowl and Orange Bowl played their inaugural game, with the Sun Bowl and the Cotton Bowl following in 1935 and 1936, respectively.

The 1939-40 season was the first time Clemson had a chance to cash in on the exclusive opportunity. After an 8-1 season, with its lone loss coming from the eventual SEC Champion Tulane, Clemson received an invite to play in the Cotton Bowl.

The Tigers played Boston College, making it the first Cotton Bowl without a team from Texas after Texas A&M declined the invite to play in the Sugar Bowl. For that reason, only an estimated 20,000 fans showed up for the game. All-American halfback Banks McFadden led Clemson to a 6-3 victory over the Eagles, whose rushing abilities paled in comparison to his punting on the day. He averaged 43 yards a punt, helping to keep Boston College out of field goal range.

It would be nine years before the Tigers were invited to another bowl, but it was the start of the winning tradition that Clemson fans get to enjoy today.