Coached Steelers and a college-aged Joe Greene

OCEAN CITY, N.J. — Rod Rust, who coached Hall of Fame defensive lineman “Mean” Joe Greene at North Texas State and later served as a coach with the Steelers, has died. He was 90.

Mr. Rust, who also was defensive coordinator for the New England Patriots’ 1985 Super Bowl team, died Tuesday at his home in Ocean City, N.J.

A native of Webster City, Iowa, Mr. Rust was a center and a linebacker at Iowa State in the late 1940s. After graduating, he spent a decade coaching football at various Iowa high schools before advancing to the college ranks as an assistant with New Mexico and Stanford in the early 1960s before landing his first head coaching job at North Texas State in 1967. He was there until 1972, during which time he helped mold Mr. Greene.

Mr. Rust described Greene as “a fort on foot.”

He moved to the CFL with Montreal in 1973 and took his first NFL job as linebackers coach with Philadelphia in 1976 under then-new head coach Dick Vermeil.

Mr. Rust left the Eagles to become the Chiefs’ defensive coordinator in 1978 and then took over the same post with the Patriots in 1983. Three seasons later, he was part of the first Super Bowl team in Patriots history. That New England team fell to the Chicago Bears in Super Bowl XX in New Orleans.

Mr. Rust also was a defensive coordinator for Pittsburgh, the New York Giants and Atlanta.

His time with the Steelers was short. After serving as defensive coordinator in 1989, the Patriots hired him to be their head coach. At the time, he was the only Steelers assistant to ever be hired by another team as its head coach.