After Boston College football’s Fenway Bowl victory last season, then-starting quarterback Thomas Castellanos oozed confidence.
“Boston College will be different,” Castellanos said. “It will be.”
Less than two months later, that proclamation had seemingly come to fruition, though not because of Castellanos, but because of his new head coach. The man who raised Penn State from the dead had chosen BC as his next restoration project. Bill O’Brien was going to end BC’s decade-plus Sisyphean struggle against the seven-win barrier.
But that’s not exactly how O’Brien’s first season in Chestnut Hill turned out.
The Eagles’ 20–15 Pinstripe Bowl loss to Nebraska put them right back where they started: the seven-win mark. And that wasn’t for a lack of chances.
Whether it was the 20-point collapse against Louisville or the second-half no-show against Virginia, BC very well could’ve captured its eighth win in the regular season itself. Even against the Cornhuskers, the Eagles were just a handful of plays away from a victory.
Such what-ifs will and should haunt BC fans in the aftermath of the 2024 season, especially when looking at the overnight success produced by other first-year head coaches like Syracuse’s Fran Brown or Indiana’s Curt Cignetti. Under O’Brien, however, there’s reason to believe these missed opportunities are growing pains rather than fatal flaws.
Don’t get me wrong, BC fans have been snakebit by false optimism time and time again. I’m old enough to remember the energy and belief on campus after Jeff Hafley led the 2021 Eagles to a 4–0 start. It was only six seasons ago that Steve Addazio brought College GameDay to Stokes Lawn. We all know how those experiences ended up.
But despite the many times we’ve heard it, there really is reason to believe this era of BC football is finally different.
To me, a successful BC football head coach requires three ingredients.
First, you can’t succeed at BC if the head coaching job is just another stepping stone. Long-term success won’t come if it’s not a long-term job.
Second, you can’t succeed at BC without understanding what makes the University unique. BC’s is a program living under the shadow of the city’s professional teams, shaped by Jesuit values and a strong focus on academics—an institution strikingly different from any else in the Power 4.
Third, and most importantly, you can’t succeed at BC without putting a compelling product on the field.
Luckily for Eagles fans, O’Brien is passing all three of those tests—in year one, at least. On a number of occasions, O’Brien has emphasized his long-term commitment to BC and harped on the school’s institutional strengths. And while the 2024 season wasn’t always smooth sailing, the team remained consistently easy to root for.
And that’s not all.
Based on his resume alone, O’Brien’s hiring last February seemed like a coup. But the past years’ tectonic shifts in the college football landscape have made his hire all the more valuable. For once, BC is ahead of the curve regarding the sport’s rapid professionalization.
Just look at what Bill Belichick is trying to establish down in Chapel Hill: “an NFL program at a college level.”
Well, O’Brien was one step ahead of his former boss, assembling a coaching staff with two other former NFL head coaches Rob Chudzinski and Doug Marrone. That’s not to mention the addition of Belichick’s former right-hand man Berj Najarian, who O’Brien has lauded as “one of the most important people in our program.” That professionalization will undoubtedly pay dividends in the future when it comes to recruiting and NIL.
It’s already taken root in the program’s day-to-day habits and mindsets.
O’Brien is nothing like the friendly-faced Hafley. He’s demanding and, at times, abrasive. That “Teapot” reputation? It’s no joke. But from his first day on the Heights, O’Brien’s presence and professional operation secured his players’ buy-in.
That buy-in propelled the Eagles to their first top-25 ranking since 2018. It held the locker room together after O’Brien benched its once-unquestioned leader Castellanos. It helped BC weather the storm that the winless October brought, en route to a Pinstripe Bowl bid.
And while all of that certainly isn’t enough to declare BC is at last back, 2024 was a solid building block—especially when accounting for what 2025 has to offer.
First and foremost, 2025 offers a new opportunity at quarterback. Whether the starter ends up being Grayson James, three-star true freshman Shaker Reisig, or Alabama transfer Dylan Lonergan, O’Brien’s proven experience evaluating and coaching quarterbacks should put an end to the Eagles’ seasons-long revolving door at the position.
On the field, BC’s 2025 schedule provides the team with no shortage of opportunities to prove itself on the national level. Three 2024 College Football Playoff teams will come to Chestnut Hill—a set of matchups that will be headlined by Notre Dame’s first appearance before Eagles’ fans since 2017.
So yes, that Pinstripe Bowl loss stung. It shouldn’t be downplayed simply because of costly opt-outs or poor field conditions. But 2025 offers not just a clean slate, but a defining moment.
With O’Brien at the helm, the Eagles might finally be ready to seize it.
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