PISCATAWAY, N.J. — Greg Schiano believes that events like Friday night are crucial for coaches to be able to come together and not just learn but be able to share ideas about the game.
That’s why Schiano is especially thankful to New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick and Brian Belichick (Patriots safeties coach) for speaking at a coaching clinic hosted by Rutgers football on Friday.
Schiano saw it as an opportunity to learn and share but also for the coaches to meet afterward and discuss the concepts presented by the first family of football coaching, the Belichicks.
In fact, Schiano believes that nobody in the history of the NFL has done it better than the Patriots head coach, who has won the Super Bowl six times with the AFC East organization.
“It was really special I think for our coaches, meaning my staff, but then for all the New Jersey coaches and the New York coaches that were here and the Pennsylvania coaches, to hear what I believe is the best coach in the history of the game – to talk football,” Schiano said on Saturday following his team’s first scrimmage of spring.
“That’s one thing that all this technology robs the younger coaches of is the clinic setting. When I was coming up the coaching clinics were everything, and you’d go spend time with coaches and listen to them.
“But then the best part was afterward you were talking with all the other coaches, discussing what was presented and then how you do it. How you might change after hearing that and it was just an exchange of information. You know, the one thing you could do a clinic online, it’s great. It’s easy. But you don’t get that feedback and that conversation and that camaraderie that I remember fondly as a coach.”
Rutgers certainly has a close relationship with Belichick and the Patriots. A number of Rutgers products have gone on to have successful careers with the Patriots, making quite a pipeline between Piscataway and Foxboro.
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One of those players was Stephen Belichick, who played lacrosse at Rutgers and was a long snapper for Schiano in 2011.
“I can’t thank coach Belichick enough and Brian Belichick as well for agreeing to do it,” Schiano said.
“You know, they are in a busy time getting ready for the draft and they were starting their offseason program. Just a great friend. I’m really, really grateful for him.”
Stephen is now an outside linebackers assistant coach with the Patriots, a role he has held since 2020.
Schiano was briefly a member of the Patriots staff in 2020 as their defensive coordinator but he ended up stepping away from the position. Later that year, he returned to Rutgers as their head coach.
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