‘All roads led back here’: One-on-one with Bill O’Brien about why he ended up at Boston College
By
Tara Sullivan Globe Staff,Updated November 1, 2024, 5:00 a.m.
There’s a special kind of beauty in the family stories that get told over and over again, the ones where we already know the ending but laugh when we hear it anyway. Like connective tissue across generations, they weave their way through time, stretching back to those who came before, reaching out to those who will succeed us.
Among Bill O’Brien’s extended family, one of the classics involves Bill’s paternal grandfather,
Arthur, the man who planted the roots of their family football tree. The son of Irish immigrants who settled in South Boston, Arthur took his sixth-grade education into the workforce and also onto the semi-pro football field, playing Sunday afternoon games for
Pere Marquette.
When the local high school coach would come by and try to talk Arthur into coming to school, “he would always go, ‘My mother won’t let me,’ hiding the fact that he was playing for Pere Marquette,” Bill recalled with a smile. “It’s a famous family story. That’s where the football started.”
Like the story itself, handed down again and again, football remains.
Boston College is the beneficiary.
As the 4-4 Eagles enjoy a bye week before beginning the final third of their season Nov. 9, when they hope to break a three-game losing streak at home against Syracuse, their first-year coach took some time to reflect on the serendipitous path that took him here. The youngest of Arthur’s three grandsons by his son John and John’s wife, Anne,
Bill arrived on campus writing another common theme in the story of ourselves, about a man returning home, planting roots for what he hopes is the final time.
“In the end, all roads led back here,” he said. “This is a place where I’m very comfortable. I love Boston. My family is here, my wife Colleen went to school here, this is where we belong. It’s a place we believe in. We are both Irish Catholic, and the mission of Boston College, with academics, athletics, we understand it. I love the job and we love being here.”
Related:
Bill O’Brien says taking the BC football job is something he ‘always dreamed about’
Not far from the Andover home where he grew up, O’Brien has been energized by the chance to fortify the foundation of a program he knows all too well has to fight for its place among the crowded professional Boston sports landscape, having worked two different times as the Patriots’ offensive coordinator. But with
a thrilling opening win over
then-No. 10 Florida State, with a
step into the Top 25 rankings with an ensuing
drubbing of Duquesne, O’Brien knows what is possible when the program wins. He also knows how quickly it can evaporate, and how mistakes such as turning the ball over, missing tackles, or struggling on special teams can sink
such a promising start.
But
this is what his résumé is about. With those Patriots bona fides, running Tom Brady’s offense for Bill Belichick, as well as the winning programs he ran at Penn State and with the Houston Texans, he was the perfect hire for BC after
Jeff Hafley opted to leave for the NFL. With long-term commitment not only in his mind but in his heart, O’Brien is confident today’s generation of Eagles can reap the benefit of his years in the game.
This is home, with Colleen and their sons Jack (who has access to excellent medical support he needs for his rare brain condition lissencephaly) and Michael, over at
Tufts playing baseball. Where extended family, including his brothers Jack and Tom, are nearby. Where friends he grew up with are always within reach. Where Dunkin’ is aplenty. And where he could even bring a few old Patriot coaching friends along for the ride.
“This is a place, in the way I was brought up, going to St. John’s Prep and Brown, I understand how important education is in someone’s life, and I also understand how important football is in someone’s life,” he said. “I understand that combination of both, and I feel like this is very much a job that I fit. I’ve had a lot of jobs. Some jobs — when I coached for the Patriots, I fit there. Other places haven’t always been the greatest fit. We won games in Houston, but I wasn’t Bum Phillips. I think as you go through your career, 32 years for me, I’m looking for the right fit.
Here, he can turn to longtime confidante Berj Najarian,
his chief of staff. He can bounce ideas with close friend Doug Marrone, his
senior analyst for football strategy. He can implement Belichickian lessons such as watching practice film together as a whole staff, so everyone can learn from each other, or more business-like ones in managing NIL opportunities as mini NFL payroll decisions. He can channel the reflecting he did while away from the game (
he was fired four games into his seventh season in Houston, in 2020) and understand the power of delegating responsibility, and at the same time, he can understand the urgency of a job that ultimately comes down to wins and losses.
“I do feel we’re close, but close doesn’t count,” he said. “I think these kids are learning to play the way we want to play, they fight to the end. But too many mistakes . . . We’re learning how to play 60 minutes of football. We just have to do it.
“I’m pretty impatient, and people want to win. You can say you’re in it for the long haul, but five years from now if we’re not winning they’re going to be looking for a new coach. We went three and out to start the
[last loss against] Louisville, and the people behind the bench were on us right away. I think we’re on the right track. We’re building something.”
Related:
Bill O’Brien explains why he turned down a more lucrative offer for his first NFL job under Bill Belichick
For this coach, in this job, the construction project is a testament to those who built him. Caught again in the web of memory, O’Brien smiles as he looks around his Chestnut Hill office, the one he took over in February. He eyes a blank wall, knowing just the picture that would fit.
“It’s my grandfather, in a three-point stance,” he says. “I’ve got to go find that one. It’s somewhere in a box, from one of these moves.”
Football coaches can tell their life stories in the series of moves they make, uprooting themselves and their families as they chase promotions or look for new opportunities, climbing a ladder that can take them from high school to college to the pros, but also can shift them thousands of miles at a time.
O’Brien is no stranger to those nomadic demands. At 55 years old, a career that began in Rhode Island, coaching at Brown after his own playing days ended, has taken him to Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, New England, Pennsylvania, Houston, Alabama, Ohio, and now, back to Boston.
Back home.
Tara Sullivan is a Globe columnist.
store.barstoolsports.com
bostoncollege.rivals.com
