Here’s a cool angle to the latest New Orleans Saints news: defensive backs coach Kris Richard and defensive line coach Ryan Nielsen have been promoted to work as co-defensive coordinators under first-year head coach Dennis Allen, and they have quite a history together.
Richard and Nielsen were college teammates at USC from 1998 to 2001 under then-Trojans coach Pete Carroll. Nielsen earned All-Pac 10 recognition in 1999, and Richard went on to be selected in the third round of the 2002 NFL draft.
And while their coaching careers took them in vastly different directions, the Saints aren’t exactly throwing together a pair of strangers and telling them to figure it out. Richard immediately began coaching in the NFL on Carroll’s Seattle Seahawks staff after his playing career ended, rising to the post of defensive coordinator in 2015. Meanwhile, Nielsen spent years working at the college level and was twice nominated for the Broyles Award at NC State, until the Saints hired him as their defensive line coach in 2017.
Richard and Nielsen were coworkers last season, and now they’re in a great position to collaborate and boost both of their careers. They’ve been coveted by other teams at both the pro and college level in recent years, and if this works out, it’s going to look great on each of their resumes. If things work out as planned they could each be running their own teams in the not-so-distant future. Dennis Allen is still going to call the shots on defense given his background there, but it sure helps to have some well-positioned advisors like Nielsen and Richard at his side.
