Steve Spagnuolo was walking down a familiar hallway. Same forward-leaning strut, same spiked haircut, same gray-and-brown-haired goatee.
The only differences: a darker blue shirt and the red challenge flag hanging out of his back right pocket. That little hanky was the only glaring symbol of the Rams' head coach's recent promotion.
"It's nice to be back," Spagnuolo said as he led his team toward its preseason opener against the Jets. "It was just great walking down that tunnel into the stadium."And making the right-hand turn toward the visitors' locker room?
"Yeah, make sure I don't go the wrong way, will ya?" he said.
For the past two seasons, at the bottom of the ramp, the former Giants' defensive coordinator had made a left turn toward the cozy locker room and offices of the team whose name adorns Giants Stadium. This time, he was headed back to where he had spent his pregames while an assistant coach with the Eagles: in the tight quarters of the visitors' locker room.
But at least he did so as the man in charge. After more than 27 years as an assistant coach, scout, personnel assistant and college graduate assistant, the 49-year-old Spagnuolo is finally a NFL head coach.
Back at the place where he earned that right.
"I was not wrapped up in where we were playing," Spagnuolo said after his team held on for a 23-20 victory. "I have great memories here, but I was not wrapped up in that. I just kind of get in a little bit of a zone. It's football, it's competition. I wasn't thinking about much other than the next play, to be honest with you."
Spagnuolo's family was thinking about how long it took him to get here.
On the field before the game, his wife, Maria, greeted well-wishers and a few stadium workers she hadn't seen since last season. On the visitors' bench sat Spagnuolo's 72-year-old father, Robert, as well as Steve's sister, Robyn, and her husband.
"Why couldn't the Giants hire my son as head coach?" Robert said with a wry smile.
They couldn't because their coach -- Tom Coughlin -- had just won a Super Bowl (thanks in part to Spagnuolo, of course) and is showing no signs of slowing down at age 62. But the Rams' opponent Friday night did have a chance to hire Spagnuolo after he interviewed with the Jets in January.
"As long as he's happy, I'm happy," Robert Spagnuolo said. "But I do wish he was somewhere around here."
Maria said the only thing that's changed about her husband is the location. He's as busy and as intense as he was "even when he was a linebackers coach," she said. Former Giants safeties James Butler and Craig Dahl both said Spagnuolo's training camp, with full-contact drills and tackling almost every day, has made Coughlin's practices seem like walk-throughs.
As for whether things have changed for Spagnuolo's family and whether they're any more nervous now that he's a head coach, one needed to look no further than Maria as last night's opening kickoff sailed through the air. She was standing in a luxury box, talking to Rams general manager Billy Devaney's sister without even keeping an eye on the field.
A few plays later, as Maria turned her attention to making sure everyone in the box had enough to drink and eat, Rams defensive end Leonard Little stripped Kellen Clemens for the game's first turnover.
"Sixteen-and-oh," a smiling member of the Devaney clan said.
Maybe not. But three hours later, Spagnuolo was 1-0.
"Who says preseason doesn't matter?!" Maria yelled outside the victors' locker room before embracing her husband and walking with him up the ramp and toward an unfamiliar location -- the visiting buses.
Mike Garafolo may be reached at mgarafolo@starledger.com.