Gang add first female coach

Collette Smith made history Saturday be becoming the Jets’ first female coach.

Smith, 44, is a coaching intern this summer with the Jets, assisting defensive backs coach Dennard Wilson. Smith attended a few Jets practices last year and got the attention of coach Todd Bowles.

“I met Collette over a year ago,” Bowles said Saturday. “She came to a few practices. Just talking to her over the course of time, her football knowledge is outstanding. It’s all male interns so far, and I thought it would be a good idea to bring in a female intern, strictly off of her skillset, not because she’s a female. She’s a hell of a football coach. We got to talking a lot, and she fits in with the guys. We gave her a chance.”

The Jets do not allow coaching interns to speak to the media.

Smith grew up in Queens rooting for the Jets. She played three years in the Independent Women’s Football League for the New York Sharks before a knee injury ended her playing career.

She is the third woman to coach in the NFL.

The Jets made a number of changes to their training facility in Florham Park. One big one is they moved the Lombardi Trophy from their Super Bowl III win to the lobby where the players enter the building. It had been on the other side of the building, which is the business entrance. Nose tackle Steve McLen

don led the charge to put the trophy where the players could see it every day. He and a few other players petitioned Bowles, who agreed with the move.

“We had a bunch of alterations in the building,” Bowles said. “That was one of them, moving it down that way, seeing the players having a goal for what we’re shooting for every day when they walk into the building. We put it on the other end because that’s where the player entrance is and they walk in every day.”