Boston College’s Hafley hired as Packers DC

• Pete Thamel, ESPNJan 31, 2024, 06:21 PM ET

The Green Bay Packers have worked with Boston College head coach Jeff Hafley as their new protective planner, the team announced Wednesday.

“We are delighted to invite Jeff, his spouse, Gina, and their daughters, Hope and Leah, to the Packers and the Green Bay community,” Packers coach Matt LaFleur said in a declaration. “Jeff has actually had success at every stop of his coaching career with an excellent performance history of developing players at every level. We anticipate him leading our defense.”

Hafley went 22-26 in 4 seasons at Boston College, bringing the Eagles to bowl eligibility in 3 of his four years. Boston College completed 7-6 this season with a win over No. 22 SMU in the Fenway Bowl.Hafley had resisted prior NFL coaching opportunities in the past. However his reasons for taking this organizer task are rooted in both the total state of college football and the opportunity to work for one of the NFL’s the majority of respected franchises.Editor’s Picks 2 Associated” He wishes to go coach football again in a

league that is everything about football,”a source informed ESPN.”College coaching has become fundraising, NIL and hiring your own group and transfers. There’s no time at all to coach football anymore.”A lot of things that he went back to college for have disappeared. “Hafley becomes the

3rd sitting college head coach to leave on his accord this year for a planner task. He follows South Alabama’s Kane Wommack and Buffalo’s Maurice Linguist. They both took planner tasks at Alabama, and the moves talk to the space created as the top-tier schools pull away from the others in terms of resources. That’s only been magnified in this era of name, image and likeness offers being important to recruiting and roster retention.The future of the Packers showed a substantial attraction to Hafley, as they have a strong young core and intense future.

He’s a longtime friend of LaFleur’s and long time admirer of the Packers franchise.He’ll change Joe Barry and be the third different defensive planner as LaFleur enters his 6th year as the franchise’s head coach.While LaFleur and Hafley have never straight collaborated, they have some mutual connections. Hafley was the Browns’protective backs coach in 2014-15 under then-head coach Mike Pettine, who was LaFleur’s first protective coordinator in Green Bay (2019-20). Hafley also worked for 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan, among LaFleur’s mentors. Hafley was the 49ers’ defensive backs coach from 2016 to ’18 before he became Ohio State’s co-defensive coordinator.The rest of the Packers protective coaching staff is under contract for the 2024 season and none of them was let go when the Packers parted ways with Barry. So there’s a great chance some– or all– of them might return to work under Hafley.Hafley is a veteran NFL assistant coach who worked 7 years in the NFL training numerous secondary positions before going back to college football as Ohio State’s defensive coordinator in 2019. Hafley ended up being Boston College’s head coach following the 2019 season, taking over for the COVID-19-affected season of 2020. He had one losing record in 4 years– 3-9 in 2022. The previous 3 Boston College coaches have failed to win 9 games, as the school’s last nine-win season came under Jeff Jagodzinski in 2008. Hafley’s time at Boston College consisted of 3 of the top recruiting classes in BC history. In 2022, Hafley led BC to its first win over an Associated Press-ranked opponent since 2014 when BC upset No. 16 NC State. BC’s bowl win this season was the school’s very first since 2016. Information from ESPN’s Rob Demovsky was utilized in this report.