File photos | Associated Press

Virginia football coach George Welsh (center) poses with his coaching staff in September of 1986. From left: Tony Whittlesey, Frank Spaziani, Art Markos, Ken Mack, Tom O'Brien and Bob Petchel.

Boston College head coach Frank Spaziani (left) speaks with North Carolina State coach Tom O'Brien following their game last month, won by the Eagles. Spaziani and O'Brien coached together under George Welsh at both Navy and Virginia.

It has been nearly 20 years since Frank Spaziani last stepped inside Scott Stadium, and this time he'll be viewing Virginia's football home from a completely different perspective.

Spaziani, the first-year head coach at Boston College, will be on the visitors' sideline when Virginia entertains the Eagles on Saturday. For nine seasons, he had another outlook as a UVa assistant from 1982-1990.

This is the Eagles' fifth season in the ACC, but it will be their first trip to Charlottesville. They play in the ACC's Atlantic Division, while Virginia belongs to the Coastal Division, and their only meeting as ACC foes came in 2005. Spaziani, who was BC's defensive coordinator at the time, watched then-No. 18 Boston College defeat UVa 28-17 in Chestnut Hill, Mass.

A few things have changed at Scott Stadium since Spaziani last observed it. Stately columns -- or pergolas -- now ring the walk above the north end zone and a 2000 expansion raised capacity to 61,500.

In 1995, Virginia made the move to natural grass after ripping up the Astroturf that Spaziani knew.

He served as defensive backs coach on George's Welsh initial UVa staff in 1982 and was promoted to defensive coordinator in 1987, which was the first year that Welsh even designated a defensive coordinator. With Spaziani overseeing the defense, UVa was ranked No. 1 in the country for three weeks in 1990, the only time the Cavaliers ever have been ranked No. 1.

Virginia won its first seven games before losing to eventual national co-champion Georgia Tech 41-38 in Charlottesville. The Cavaliers won at North Carolina the next week, then lost their last three games.

Following the season, Welsh made the decision to replace Spaziani as defensive coordinator. Spaziani was given the option of coaching defensive backs under new coordinator Rick Lantz but declined.

"After playing Louisville in 1988 and '89 and knowing about Rick Lantz, I wanted to change our defense from a 3-4 to a four-man line, which we eventually adopted in 1991," Welsh said in a January interview following Spaziani's appointment as BC's head coach.

History would suggest that Spaziani was made a scapegoat for the 1990 collapse, much of which occurred after an injury to star quarterback Shawn Moore.

"That's your opinion," Spaziani said with no malice apparent. "Let me just say this: That was then and this is now. When you take the whole body of stuff, I have nothing but tremendous memories of Virginia and my experience there, and I can't tell you how valuable it's been to me."

Tyrone Lewis, a UVa defensive back at the time, said he thinks Spaziani might have been at Virginia for a long time if the Cavaliers hadn't squandered a 16-0 lead in a 23-22 loss to Tennessee in the Sugar Bowl.

"I can tell you, as players, we never blamed 'Spaz' for that," Lewis said Tuesday. "And the funny thing is, he's coaching an attacking 4-3 defense at BC."

Spaziani said he and Welsh have not made plans to get together this weekend but they speak periodically. Boston College offensive coordinator Gary Tranquill had three tenures as a Welsh assistant at Navy and Virginia.

Spaziani was out of coaching in 1991, a year he spent "in reflection," as he called it. His wife was a teacher in Charlottesville, but he re-entered the coaching field in 1992 as a Canadian Football League assistant.

"I was in the Witness Protection Program in Winnipeg," he said jokingly in a Tuesday morning interview.

He actually spent five years in Canada, two with the Blue Bombers and three with the Calgary Stampeders.

"It was a case of getting the right results even if you made the wrong decision," said Spaziani of a fairly unusual career move. "How did I know that it would be so rewarding, that it would expose me to so many things and be so enlightening? Man, that was the luckiest thing that ever happened to me."

In Canada, where the field is wider, longer and has just three downs, offenses are more wide-open, and Spaziani crafted a philosophy that suited an ever-evolving college game.

When ex-UVa offensive coordinator Tom O'Brien was named Boston College head coach in 1995, Spaziani was among his first hires. The Eagles subsequently posted eight consecutive winning seasons, after which North Carolina State came calling in 2006.

O'Brien took the job at the end of the regular season and Spaziani was named to coach the Eagles in the Meineke Car Care Bowl.

"That was the most difficult coaching assignment and experience that I've ever had -- that 30-some days," Spaziani said. "That also was very enlightening. Doing something for the first time is never easy."

Spaziani wasn't named to succeed O'Brien but elected to stay at Boston College as defensive coordinator under Jeff Jagodzinski. Then, when Jagodzinski and BC parted company after the 2008 season, the Eagles promoted Spaziani.

At 61, he was a head coach for the first time.

However, he says he never felt an emptiness in his three-plus decades as an assistant.

"Whether it's myopic or not, I've just always done the job in front of me to the best of my ability," he said. "That's what I'm supposed to do. Take it seriously but don't take myself too seriously."