The “Dan Mullen Bowl” will take place Saturday night when Florida visits Mississippi State, and Mullen is fine with that.
No Southeastern Conference football game this season will be about one person more than this showdown between the 3-1 Gators and the 3-1 Bulldogs. Mullen spent the previous nine seasons guiding Mississippi State to milestone after milestone, but he’s now in his first season as Florida’s head coach.
Whether this particular showdown has more personal significance to him or not, Mullen is welcoming the attention.
“This is not hard for me,” Mullen said Monday in his weekly news conference. “This takes the pressure off of everyone else. Our guys can focus on the opponent and beating an excellent team. Our guys have a lot going on and a lot to worry about, so if the outside focus is on me, it takes it off our guys and lets them prepare for the game.”
Florida and Mississippi State will collide at 6 EDT on ESPN.
Mullen went 5-7 in his first season in Starkville in 2009 but took the Bulldogs to bowl games in all of his last eight seasons, a stretch highlighted by an Orange Bowl appearance following the 2014 season and three trips to the Gator Bowl. Mississippi State never had been to more than three consecutive bowls before his arrival.
The 2014 Bulldogs, who were guided by junior quarterback Dak Prescott, won their first nine games and earned the program’s first No. 1 national ranking with a 38-23 defeat of No. 2 Auburn midway through that season. The undefeated surge ended with a 25-20 loss at No. 5 Alabama, with the Crimson Tide winning that season’s league crown.
Mississippi State posted a 5-4 record in the Egg Bowl rivalry with Ole Miss during Mullen’s nine seasons, but there is an uncertainty as to how he will be received after bolting from the SEC West to a flashier SEC East program with three national championships in the last quarter century.
More than half of Mullen’s news conference Monday dealt with his return, including how he expects to be received.
“I don’t know. What do you think?” Mullen responded to a reporter. “I think there will be a lot of passion Saturday night, but I think a majority of people are appreciative of what we were able to accomplish in our nine seasons there. I don’t know if that will be shown on Saturday night, but I think they are appreciative.”
This is actually a second Mullen Bowl at Davis Wade Stadium, because Mullen left his role as Florida’s offensive coordinator after a 2008 national championship season and hosted the Gators in his debut year at MSU. Florida won that game 29-19, overcoming two Tim Tebow interceptions that were returned for touchdowns.
Saturday marks the inaugural Mullen Bowl for first-year Mississippi State coach Joe Moorhead, who isn’t oblivious to the hype.
“Obviously the emotional component is going to be attached to this game, and it’s relative to Coach Mullen and his staff being with these guys for an extended period of time,” Moorhead said Monday in his weekly news conference. “Ultimately, at the end of the day, I’m not going to be on the field taking any snaps, and neither are our assistants or any of their coaches. The game is going to be played within the white lines between 11 Florida players and 11 Mississippi State players.
“I don’t think you can discount the emotional part of this, but you have to manage it.”
Mullen’s situation is not unique to previous encounters of an SEC coach leaving one program for another only to have to face his former program in his first season. Tommy Tuberville left Ole Miss after four years for Auburn after the 1998 season, and the Tigers hosted the Rebels in 1999 and traveled to Oxford in 2000.
Another instance was former Ole Miss coach Houston Nutt taking the Rebels to Arkansas in 2008 after coaching the Razorbacks for 10 seasons.
Could Saturday night’s outcome boil down to which coaching staff knows Mississippi State better?
“You have an understanding of personnel on the team and familiarity with players,” Mullen said. “That helps a little bit instead of studying every strength and weakness about a guy. You already have an idea.”
Said Moorhead: “Hopefully we know as much about our personnel as they know about our personnel.”
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6524.