Paul Pasqualoni, the man who helped give Matt Patricia his first coaching job, is now the defensive coordinator for the Detroit Lions.
Pasqualoni actually hired Patricia as a graduate assistant at Syracuse in 2001. The new Lions head coach is apparently incredibly grateful, plucking his mentor who was last with Boston College as a defensive line coach.
Pasqualoni has been around the block, coaching in both the National Football League and college football for an extended period of time.
At 68 years old, Pasqualoni was the head coach at Syracuse in 1991-2004. He had another stint as a head coach at UConn in 2011-13. He also worked as defensive coordinator for the Miami Dolphins in 2008-09, and spent time as a defensive line coach for the Chicago Bears, Houston Texans and Dallas Cowboys.
Patricia recently spoke about his new defensive coordinator.
"It was obviously a great opportunity for me to go home," Patricia said last week of working with Pasqualoni. "Syracuse was home for me, and when you grew up in that area there really is no professional sports, so at the time it was Syracuse football, Syracuse basketball, that's kind of what it is out there. And to have that opportunity to go back and then just to see kind of Coach Pasqualoni's, the way that he handled the team, the way that he coached the team and the way that just everything was in order, very much sort of how you would want a football team run."
