Kelly morphed into one of Clemson's best

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — It's a call Clemson coach Dabo Swinney gets a thousand times a season.

It's usually from a high school coach or a friend and sometimes even from a fan who has just seen the "next great Clemson player."

Normally, Swinney is polite, asks a few questions, takes down the information, and files it in the "you've-got-to-be-kidding-me" cabinet.

One in a hundred calls actually turns out to be credible and Swinney will take a serious look at the prospect.

Then there's Aaron Kelly, who turned out to be that one-in-a-million player.

Early in the fall of 2003, Swinney got a call from Curtis Brown, a former teammate and wide receiver at Alabama.

Brown, who grew up on Johns Island and played at St. John's High School, had been working out with Kelly, a lanky wide receiver at Walton (Ga.) High School, and thought he had a chance to play in the Atlantic Coast Conference.

"At first I just kind of rolled my eyes and thought, 'here we go again,' " said Swinney, who was the Tigers' wide receivers coach at the time. "I must get this call three or four times a week

and 99 percent of them turn out to be nothing. But Curt was pretty convinced that Aaron had some talent and he could play.

"I knew Curt had a pretty good eye, so I think that's what kind of pushed me over the edge and I told him to send up some film on Aaron."

Swinney wasn't hopeful. For one thing, he'd never heard of Kelly, who lived in an upscale Atlanta suburb, less than two hours from the Clemson campus.

"If he was that good, then I would have already heard of him," Swinney said. "I called around and found out that Wake Forest and Duke were interested in him, but that he hadn't got much interest from Georgia or Georgia Tech and he was right in their backyards."

When Kelly's "highlight" tape finally arrived, Swinney took a look at it. He popped it out and then looked at it again. And a third time.

Sure, there were deficiencies in his game, but there was no doubt Kelly had potential.

"Aaron was all arms and legs," Swinney said. "He was like 6-4 or 6-5, and he wasn't very strong, but he was a lot quicker than most guys with his frame. The thing that really jumped at me was his ability to return kicks. Normally you have those small, quick guys returning kicks, the kind of player that can make a quick move and then accelerate.

"On film, Aaron would just make guys look silly and then he was gone. By the end of the season most teams stopped kicking to him. That's what sold me on him."

Swinney knew it would take time for Kelly to develop. He would need to get stronger and develop a better work ethic, but one day, Swinney thought he could be an impact player.

Kelly didn't exactly get off to a great start at Clemson.

"I felt like Aaron's work ethic could improve early in his career," Swinney said. "We certainly had some disagreements about that. I think midway through his sophomore season, the light finally went on for Aaron. He started doing all the little stuff on and off the field. You could see him just growing not only as a player, but as a human being."

Kelly had a monster junior season, catching 88 passes for 1,081 yards and 11 TDs.

"It seemed like every week the defense really keyed on Aaron, but no one could stop him," said Clemson quarterback Cullen Harper. "Teams might start out putting just one guy on him, but by the end of the game he'd have two or three guys around him. I knew if I put the ball anywhere near him, he'd come down with it."

Kelly enters today's Gator Bowl as the Atlantic Coast Conference's all-time leading receiver with 226 catches. Kelly needs just 23 receiving yards this afternoon to break Terry Smith's school record of 2,681 yards. When that happens he'll have every major receiving mark in school history.

"If you'd have told me five years ago that Aaron Kelly would finish his career as the ACC's all-time leading receiver I would have walked away," Swinney said. "I think that just shows you what kind of competitor Aaron is."