At his introductory news conference back in February, Mike Vrabel detailed a simple but important goal for his first season as Patriots head coach: His team needed to be “good enough to take advantage of bad football.”
Up the road in Chestnut Hill, a former New England coach is preaching a similar message.
Bill O’Brien, whose maiden season at Boston College was derailed by a string of crippling late-game errors, is making “eliminate bad football” a top priority as he enters Year 2 with the Eagles. BC opens its season at 2 p.m. Saturday against Fordham at Alumni Stadium.
“(We had) too much bad football last year in key games,” O’Brien, the ex-Patriots offensive coordinator, said during training camp. “We were in games with very, very good teams, and those teams took advantage of our bad football. We did not take advantage of their bad football relative to those losses. So we have to play cleaner. We’ve got a lot of good players in this program — every kid is a great kid — and we can do this, but we have to eliminate bad football. That’s something we continue to harp on.”
Overall, O’Brien’s first BC team played much cleaner football than its 2023 predecessor. After ranking 86th nationally in penalties per game and turnover margin under former head coach Jeff Hafley, the Eagles vaulted to 12th (first in the ACC) and tied for 19th (third in the ACC), respectively. They cut their interception total in half and were competitive in all 13 of their games.
But in too many critical moments, that composure cracked.
There was the fourth-quarter interception and drive-extending fourth-down penalty that sank their Week 2 upset bid at Missouri. The late-game meltdown against Virginia, with BC going INT, turnover on downs, INT on its final three drives. Losing two fumbles inside the 20-yard line and committing three pre-snap penalties against Virginia Tech. Gaining 70 total yards on their final six possessions in an October nosedive versus Louisville. The fourth-quarter miscues that foiled another would-be upset against eventual College Football Playoff qualifier SMU.
In their consecutive losses to UVA, Va. Tech and Louisville — a skid that torpedoed the Eagles’ shot at local and national relevance following an encouraging 4-1 start — O’Brien’s troops were outscored 46-0 in the fourth quarter.
The end result: another characteristically unremarkable season for a program that hasn’t risen above mediocrity since most of its current players were toddlers.
BC won exactly seven games for the eighth time in the last 15 years and went an even .500 against ACC opponents for the eighth time in the last 15 years. The Eagles have not won eight-plus games nor topped .500 in conference play since 2009. The last time they finished a season ranked in the AP Top 25 was 2007, Matt Ryan’s final year at The Heights.
“(We need) less penalties and less turnovers. Those two things will get you beat,” offensive coordinator Will Lawing said. “We put a lot of emphasis on that, trying to get down to zero every practice. That’s the goal. Clean football will win you games, and especially in critical points of the season in certain games. We really have to eliminate pre-snap penalties, the dumb stuff, and take care of the football.”
Boston College quarterbacks Dylan Lonergan (9) and Grayson James (3) throw during training camp. (Zack Cox/Boston Herald)
O’Brien and Lawing are hoping a change at quarterback can aid in this effort.
Alabama transfer Dylan Lonergan beat out incumbent Grayson James for the starting job in camp, giving BC a promising new passer with an SEC pedigree. Lonergan is a former four-star player whom O’Brien recruited during his time as Alabama’s OC, but he has very little collegiate experience, having served as a backup behind Jalen Milroe and Ty Simpson during his two seasons in Tuscaloosa. Listed at 6-foot-2, 211 pounds, the redshirt sophomore attempted just eight total passes for the Crimson Tide, all in blowouts.
Despite his limited action, O’Brien said Lonergan has “a great feel for the game,” “a really good arm” and “was a little bit ahead of Grayson” as a passer this summer. He was named the starter on Aug. 12.
“He has made a lot of strides since he got here in the spring, picking up the offense, getting around his teammates and getting on the same page with those guys,” said Lawing, who’s worked under O’Brien every year since 2013, including one season as the Patriots’ tight ends coach in 2023. “He’s certainly shown some leadership ability, too. I’m excited about that. He’s done everything we’ve asked him to do, and he’s doing a great job.”
If the untested Lonergan struggles, the Eagles could turn back to James, who posted solid numbers after leapfrogging former starter Thomas Castellanos midway through last season (that move prompted Castellanos to immediately leave the team; he’s now QB1 at Florida State). The 6-foot-3, 218-pound redshirt senior completed 63.9% of his passes for 1,202 yards and six touchdowns with two picks in 2024, and BC went 4-2 with him behind center, including a win over Syracuse that he entered after halftime.
Surrounding Lonergan will be top receivers Lewis Bond, Reed Harris and Jaedn Skeete; a talented tight end room headlined by senior Jeremiah Franklin and another Bama transfer, Ty Lockwood; and a retooled backfield, with Turbo Richard, Jordan McDonald and Alex Broome moving up the depth chart following the departures of Kye Robichaux and Treshaun Ward.
Of that group, only Bond topped 500 yards from scrimmage last season, catching 67 passes for 689 yards and three touchdowns to lead the Eagles in receiving for the second straight year. Harris, a 6-foot-4 big-play threat, tallied 486 receiving yards and four touchdowns on just 17 catches.
“There’s a lot more (wideout) depth, which really helps,” Lawing said.
Richard and McDonald were depth options behind lead backs Robichaux and Ward last season, while Broome is back in the mix after missing all of 2024 with a torn ACL. True freshman Bo MacCormack, who set the all-time Massachusetts high school rushing record at Buckingham Browne & Nichols, also could contribute on offense and in the return game.
Boston College head football coach Bill O'Brien during a training camp practice. (Zack Cox/Boston Herald)
Up front, BC will be trusting an offensive line that lost three starters to the NFL. Its D-line experienced even more turnover, including the loss of All-American edge rusher Donovan Ezeiruaku, a second-round pick by Dallas who accounted for more than half of BC’s 31 sacks last season. Returning D-end Quintayvious Hutchins was a distant second with 3 1/2 sacks.
The Eagles should benefit from more continuity on the back end, as their secondary remains mostly intact from last season. Safeties KP Price, Omar Thornton and Carter Davis; cornerbacks Syair Torrence, Amari Jackson and Max Tucker; and nickel Cameron Martinez headline that group, with Torrence looking primed for a larger role after mostly playing on special teams as a freshman.
Speaking of special teams, that’s one area that must improve for BC to meet O’Brien’s “no bad football” mandate. Last year’s team ranked 128th in net punting and attempted an FBS-low five total field goals, making three of them.
Since O’Brien trusted neither his field-goal operation nor his punting unit, only seven FBS teams went for it on fourth down more often than the Eagles — and all of them converted at a higher rate than BC’s lackluster 44.4%. In its season-ending 20-15 loss to Nebraska in the Pinstripe Bowl, BC missed a field goal and had four turnovers on downs, including one on fourth-and-14 and another on fourth-and-7.
Those margins matter for every team, but especially one like Boston College that does not boast an elite offense (tied for 67th in scoring in 2024) or a suffocating defense (T-53rd). BC lost just one game by more than 10 points last season (42-21 at Virginia Tech) and was within a touchdown in the fourth quarter in all six of its losses.
O’Brien and special teams coordinator Matt Thurin stressed the need for more consistency from kickers Liam Connor and Luca Lombardo, who both are back this season. They’re optimistic, though, about their new direction at punter after what Thurin called a “heck of a battle” this summer between grad transfer Shamus Florio and freshman Andy Quinn, a 6-foot-4 rugby convert from Ireland.
This new collection of Eagles will look to navigate a schedule that’s favorable through September, then punishingly difficult from mid-October on.
Following Saturday’s opener against FCS Fordham, they’ll travel to Michigan State before facing Stanford (away) and Cal (home), who ranked 15th and 17th in the ACC’s preseason media poll, respectively. Then, after an Oct. 4 visit to Pitt, they’ll enter a six-week gauntlet that features matchups against four of the top five teams in the preseason ACC rankings — vs. Clemson on Oct. 11, at Louisville on Oct. 25, vs. SMU on Nov. 8 and vs. Georgia Tech on Nov. 15 — plus a home date with longtime rival and 2024 national runner-up Notre Dame on Nov. 1.
Clemson is ranked fourth in the preseason AP Top 25, with the Fighting Irish — who have not played at Alumni Stadium since 2020 and have not done so with fans present since 2017 — close behind at No. 6. BC’s regular season concludes at Syracuse on Nov. 29.
One conference foe not on the Eagles’ 2025 schedule: North Carolina. An O’Brien vs. Bill Belichick showdown could only take place if BC and UNC both reach the ACC Championship.