Rumors crackled through college football Twitter and Instagram on Sunday night, claiming Clemson quarterback Cade Klubnik had been T-boned at an intersection just off campus and was left unable to lift his throwing arm. Within minutes, the “news” metastasized across Instagram stories, TikTok feeds, and every fan board you can imagine, turning what should have been a quiet game-week evening into full-blown panic for Tiger Nation. If the story were true, Clemson’s title hopes, and maybe Klubnik’s career, would have been wobbling on two wheels. It felt like deja vu for a sport that has seen too many of these midnight scare stories lately.

The spark came from TigerNet, where a poster calling himself “JacobyMoore” spun an emotional tale he said came straight from his first-responder brother. “My brother is a first responder near the University and, well about 30 mins ago now, someone T-boned a car… it is Kade Klubnik inside… he couldn’t move his arm and shoulder,” the post read. He added that, at 57, he didn’t “carry my phone a lot,” but the wreck “looked pretty bad,” a small detail that somehow made the whole thing feel alarmingly real.

Message Board Geniuses, the Twitter account that lives off screenshotting absurd fan-board fodder, blasted the post out with a bright red BREAKING banner, and the thing went nuclear. Clemson supporters offered prayers; rival fans fired off schadenfreude memes; even neutral observers wondered how the Tigers would survive without their preseason All-American. The original author, meanwhile, leaned into the drama, saying he was “heartbroken and panicking at the moment,” stoking even more fear before quietly disappearing back into anonymity.

It took Cade’s mom to calm the storm. Reached by CBS Sports, Kim Klubnik texted a brisk rebuttal: “Thankfully, it is fake news. Cade is fine!” Relief, though, came laced with frustration. “My heart has not stopped racing since someone shared the story with me,” she admitted. A moment later, she asked the question every parent with an athlete-child eventually asks: “How can someone be so cruel?” Reporters confirmed her account, the TigerNet thread vanished, and Clemson exhaled.

Kim saved one last dagger for the digital rumor mill: “How can it be OK to spread rumors like this?” It’s a fair question, especially when you remember LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier battled his own phantom ACL tear earlier in camp. These aren’t harmless pranks; they detonate in living rooms where families are just trying to eat dinner, sending pulses racing and group texts flying. If you’re hitting “post” for the cheap thrill of going viral, maybe pause and picture the mother on the other end of that notification—because she’ll be the one left picking up the pieces long after the internet moves on.

A rivalry’s punchline turns into draft-day talk

Some Clemson faithful couldn’t help but laugh when message-board detectives decided the whole Cade-Klubnik-car-crash fiasco must have been cooked up by either LSU die-hards looking to rattle the Tigers before Week 1 or South Carolina partisans still stewing over last November’s beat-down. After all, Clemson opens against LSU in New Orleans, so pinning the fake-injury scare on a Baton Rouge IP address fits the meme-ish narrative floating around TigerNet. Gamecock fans, meanwhile, are perennial suspects anytime Clemson’s quarterback catches a stray rumor. The joke has taken on a life of its own, but it also shows how intensely people are watching Garrett Nussmeier and Cade Klubnik hurtle toward their season-opening showdown.

That matchup doubles as an early referendum on two quarterbacks whose draft stock is already being pitted against each other. Nussmeier could have jumped after a 4,052-yard, Texas-Bowl-MVP season, yet he stayed because, as he put it, “I’ve always wanted to win a national championship here.” His decision sets up a delicious contrast with Klubnik, whom ESPN’s Todd McShay just bumped ahead of the LSU veteran on his August 14 podcast. “I’m going instead of Garrett Nussmeier with Cade Klubnik,” McShay said. “I see upside in him with the mobility. There’s just something—some guys have ‘it’.” With that one line, McShay not only handed Klubnik the imaginary Cleveland Browns jersey at No. 1 but also gave LSU fans fresh incentive to needle Clemson supporters about draft hype.

McShay’s rationale hinged on what he saw in person at the Manning Passing Academy: “Who’s sitting there at the end of practice on the 50-yard line picking Peyton Manning’s brain? That was Klubnik.” The Clemson junior felt it, too. “I felt like I was a better QB by the time I left, in just a few short days,” he said of his second trip to Thibodaux. Meanwhile, the same mock draft slid Nussmeier to the Jets at No. 4, a respectable landing spot but hardly the top-five lock some forecasted last winter. So when jokes fly about LSU fans planting rumors to derail Klubnik’s week, there’s a wink of truth beneath the trolling: one night in the Superdome may go a long way toward deciding which quarterback hears his name first at the 2026 draft.