Bill O'Brien speaks on Bill Belichick: "I love Bill"
BOSTON -- Massachusetts native Bill O'Brien returned to new England last year for a second stint coaching the New England Patriots under head coach Bill Belichick. After bouncing from Penn State to Houston and then to Alabama, the move marked an opportunity for O'Brien to return home.
As we know now, though, that stint was short. The Patriots went 4-13, Belichick was let go, and the team turned the reins over to new head coach Jerod Mayo. Needing a job, O'Brien quickly found one as the offensive coordinator at Ohio State.
Yet thanks to Jeff Hafley's decision to leave Boston College to join the Packers' coaching staff, a new opportunity back home arose for O'Brien. And on Thursday in Chestnut Hill, O'Brien was introduced as the 37th head coach in the history of B.C.
"It's been a great couple days," O'Brien told WBZ-TV's Dan Roche. "It's a place that really fits everything that I believe in."
While the 54-year-old has clearly landed on his feet, he also reflected on that brief second stint with the Patriots.
"Yeah, it was tough. It was tough. I love Bill. I love working for Bill," O'Brien said. "Bill taught me a lot about a lot of different things. He taught me a lot about, obviously, football. But he taught me a lot about other things that go into football. I just watched his work ethic every day when I was here before, 2007 through '11. And then when I came back this past year, his work ethic never changed. In fact, it might have been even more than it was this year."
Despite the optimism that O'Brien brought to New England, the team ranked last in scoring, thus leading to some major changes.
"It just didn't go well," O'Brien said. "We turned it over a lot, we just didn't play well offensively. We had a good defense. We just couldn't match what the defense was doing. It just didn't go well. Those things happen in football, and you turn the page. I wish Coach Mayo and that staff the best. I wish them the very best. Like I said in there, the Krafts mean a lot to me and my family, and I wish everybody at the Patriots the best."
Among the numerous tasks at his new job is the quest to get a foothold for BC football in the sports-crazed city of Boston.
"We're a part of that Boston fabric. We need to do a good job of making sure we put a good product on the field and making sure that we become a part of that city life, relative to those teams," O'Brien said. "Look, we're not the Red Sox, we're not the Patriots, we're not the Celtics, but we can have our own niche in Boston. And I think that's a big part of our selling point to guys coming in here and playing."
