Ties between Atlanta Falcons’ Matt Ryan, Miami Dolphins’ Brian Flores stretch to Boston College days

It may come as a text message this week, a conversation on the field at Hard Rock Stadium before the Atlanta Falcons and Miami Dolphins play on Sunday or, more than likely, a brief chat after. But at some point, the interaction and latest reunion will come.

Matt Ryan and Dolphins coach Brian Flores have known each other for almost 20 years, well before Ryan became an NFL MVP in Atlanta and Flores rose through the New England Patriots coaching system to land the head job in Miami. Nah, this goes back, coincidentally, to Boston. But not to the Patriots.

Instead, to Boston College. To the year 2003, when Flores was a fifth-year senior linebacker considered one of the leaders of the Eagles defense. One of the men preparing him daily to play on Saturdays was the freshman quarterback who ran the scout team — Ryan.

How those practices went depends on whom you ask.

Flores: “He was carving us up as a scout-team player and we wanted him out of there. That’s the true story.”

Ryan: “I just remember getting my ass kicked most days. Those are one of the years you want to, like, delete from your memory. Scout team getting pushed around, 18-year-old kid, probably 190 pounds getting pushed around. [Flores] was just tough, a tough football player.”

The truth, as it always tends to be, likely resided somewhere in the middle. Flores was a pain to block, then-freshman running back Jo-Lonn Dunbar said, because he always — always — was in the right spot, creating pressure when he needed to. Ryan was the player who fit in with the upperclassmen early, occasionally being invited along to outside-of-football events with a tight-knit group of players including Flores and offensive lineman Augie Hoffman.

“You could tell the kid was going to be different,” Hoffman said. “He was just a different type of…