Coen Reveals 2 Impressive Coaching Traits Gleaned From McVay

As Liam Coen tells the story, his 2018 interview with Sean McVay was a “blind opp.” Coen had no direct connections to McVay but landed an interview with the Rams’ head coach 3,000 miles from his post as the offensive coordinator at the University of Maine.

Entering his second year as head coach, he lost Matt LaFleur to the Titans and, after promoting Zac Taylor, needed a new assistant wide receivers coach. He had a whiteboard and a curveball waiting for Coen.

“He's like, ‘Hey, man, how are you picking up nickel Mike pressure out of this look?’” Coen recalled during an interview on Wednesday’s edition of Pardon My Take. “And I'm up on the board like, ‘Wait, I'm interviewing for the assistant receivers job and you got me talking protections?’

“And I had never seen that, that look. And I turned to him, I said, ‘I don't know what this is.’ He's like, ‘Man, don't worry about it. It's new in the league. We're just trying to ask a bunch of people and figure it out.’”

McVay not only found a future head coach while interviewing Coen. He also used the time to improve the Rams’ offensive attack. And on their way to a berth in the Super Bowl that season, Coen picked up another important coaching lesson from McVay.

Mired in a Week 5 dogfight at Seattle that year, the Rams clung to a 33-31 advantage after the game’s fifth lead change. They didn’t want to see a sixth. Seattle took its final timeout with 1:39 remaining and the Rams facing a fourth-and-1 from their own 42-yard line.

“Sean goes around the headsets,” Coen explained on Pardon My Take. “’What do we want to do?’ You know, sneak it or punt it; obviously, give those guys the ball back again. Every single dude on the headset said punt it. Everybody. Then, he goes to Wade Phillips.”

Stop for a second and think about this. A 31-year-old head coach swallowed his pride to ask his 71-year-old defensive coordinator – who had just allowed three Russell Wilson touchdown passes and 190 Seattle rushing yards – what the offense should do. Phillips also swallowed his pride, Coen remembered.

“Wade's like, ‘Man, we haven't stopped them once. Go for it!’”

McVay took the advice of his defensive coordinator. Jared Goff sneak, first down, game over. The Rams began the year 11-1, finished 13-3 and wound up losing a defensive battle to New England in Super Bowl LIII. But on that October Sunday in Seattle, Coen learned a critical coaching mindset from McVay.

“If we don’t get it, it could have been catastrophic,” Coen said. “They're gonna go 5 yards basically to go kick the game-winning field goal. But it was that aggressive mentality there, that believing in the guys and having an understanding of like, ‘You haven't stopped them yet.’”

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