Baltimore Ravens head coach John Harbaugh and Kansas City Chiefs head coach Andy Reid are preparing their teams for the AFC Championship Game on Sunday.
For Reid, this is his sixth consecutive appearance in the AFC Championship with the Chiefs. Kansas City is 3-2 in those games while going 2-1 in the Super Bowl.
This is the fourth AFC Championship for Harbaugh in Baltimore, with the Ravens being 1-2 in those games. They defeated the San Francisco 49ers, 34-31, in Super Bowl XLVII, in 2013.
And yet, while these two coaches will be facing off on Sunday, they have shared the sidelines before.
John Harbaugh and Andy Reid Were on the Same Staff in Philadelphia
Harbaugh was the special teams coordinator in 1998 under then-coach Ray Rhodes. Reid took over the following year, and Harbaugh stayed on his staff for another eight years before becoming the defensive coordinator for one season. Following that season, he went on to become the Ravens coach.
When asked about Harbaugh this week, Reid was extremely complimentary of his former assistant.
“John does a phenomenal job. He knows the whole game,” Reid said on Wednesday during media availability. “He was a great special teams coach, a great secondary coach, and he’s been a great head coach. Very proud of him and all he’s done and accomplished.”
Reid was the coach in Philadelphia from 1999-2012, where he led the team to a record of 130-93. The Eagles won the division six times and made it to the NFC Championship on five occasions. They went 1-4 in those games, with their lone Super Bowl appearance being against the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XXXIX.
However, in 2012, the Eagles went 4-12, and Reid was fired. While his tenure ended on a disappointing note in Philadelphia, Harbaugh said he was able to take many of the lessons Reid taught him into Baltimore.
“You think about all the great coaches that were on that staff that Andy assembled and mentored and taught us all so much,” Harbaugh said on Wednesday. “We were a close group of guys, a staff that loved each other. I see a lot of that on this (Ravens) staff, too.”
One of the biggest lessons Harbaugh learned from Reid was to believe what people showed you.
“Take people where they’re at. Assume the best. Try to communicate with everybody on equal terms. I’ve never forgot that.”
New Era for Reid
After being let go by the Eagles, Reid became the head coach in Kansas City, where he has taken the team to a new level of consistency.
The Chiefs have won at least nine games every season with Reid as the coach and have made the playoffs in every season except his second year.
The matchup between them puts together two of the longest-tenured coaches in the NFL.
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Harbaugh has been the Baltimore coach for 16 years, while Reid has been in charge in Kansas City for 11 years. Only Pittsburgh Steelers head coach Mike Tomlin (17) has been at the same place longer.
During their careers, Harbaugh and Reid have matched up seven times, with Reid’s teams winning five of those games. However, none of the matchups have had stakes like this.
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