LAS VEGAS — Dan Mullen could’ve returned to coaching sooner, but the timing never seemed right and, regardless, he was fine remaining at ESPN giving his insights about the latest in college football.
But when coach Barry Odom, fresh off taking UNLV to back-to-back appearances in the Mountain West championship game, left for Purdue in December, this time felt different.
Now, the former Mississippi State and Florida coach is back on the sidelines overseeing the Rebels, who began spring practices Thursday.
“He was doing TV for three years and you want to know if that fire’s still in his belly,” UNLV athletic director Erick Harper said. “The first conversation, you could tell. The more we talked, the more you could feel the fire in his belly to get back out on the field and do what he loves to do.”
Mullen first became impressed with UNLV while in Las Vegas in 2023 to attend former Florida quarterback Tim Tebow’s College Football Hall of Fame induction. He couldn’t believe the $35 million Fertitta Football Complex that opened in 2019 and knew the Rebels spent gamedays at an NFL stadium.
“This (practice) facility was so much better than anything I had when I took the Mississippi State job,” Mullen said. “I had to build the facility there. Florida had nothing like this. Not even close to this.”
UNLV, for most of its history, has been a reclamation project. Then Odom came along and showed in his two seasons that the program could not only win, but compete for conference championships and even reach the doorstep of the College Football Playoff.
Mullen’s reputation as an offensive mastermind was the reason he was hired to keep the Rebels at that new-found level.
As Florida’s offensive coordinator under Urban Meyer, he was instrumental in helping the Gators win two national championships. Mullen went 69-46 as Mississippi State’s head coach from 2009-17, the Bulldogs appearing in bowls in all but his first season. He then recorded a 34-15 mark over four seasons at Florida that included a Southeastern Conference championship appearance in 2020.
Meyer saw early that Mullen possessed the ability to be a successful head coach, their relationship tracing back to 1999 and 2000 at Notre Dame. Mullen was a graduate assistant and Meyer the wide receivers coach.
“He was a guy that challenged and wanted to know every drill, a reason we did everything to the point it was almost annoying,” Meyer said. “His intellect, not just in football, is extremely high. His football intellect is as good as I’ve ever been around.”
Meyer was so impressed with Mullen, he took him with him when he became Bowling Green’s head coach in 2001 and then to Utah two years later. Though Mullen was officially the quarterbacks coach at both programs, Meyer said in reality he was the offensive coordinator as both combined to go 39-8 in four seasons.
“He was too young to have that title, in my opinion, because he didn’t have the ability to stand in front of a room yet,” Meyer said. “I knew he would develop it, but his job was much more important than just quarterback coach.”
When Meyer took Mullen to Florida in 2005, this time it was as his offensive coordinator, believing he had the experience at this point to ...
