There was this old media room at Bowling Green in 2001. They would spend nights in it moving tables and chairs around. They would talk technique. How to make it all work. It never had been done before. It was mostly trial and error. Then came hours and hours of watching football off VHS tapes.
And so the spread offense was born.
“We’d try all sorts of different things in practice,” said Urban Meyer, the Hall of Fame coach. “There was really no playbook for it.
“The first thing that stood out about Dan was not only his football intelligence, but his overall intelligence was off the charts. He’d always ask questions and push for answers. He’s the best offensive coach I’ve ever been around.”
Now, Dan Mullen hopes to bring such creativity to UNLV, which begins spring practice Thursday.
Hopes to continue what has been historically winning ways the past two years.
Mullen replaces Barry Odom, who led the Rebels to two consecutive bowl games for the first time until departing for Purdue following last season.
The 52-year-old Mullen, who won 103 games at Southeastern Conference coaching stops Mississippi State and Florida. Who first worked under Meyer as a graduate assistant at Notre Dame in 1999. Back when Meyer tutored wide receivers for the Fighting Irish.
The two would be joined at the hip for several years, Mullen on staffs of Meyer at Bowling Green, Utah and Florida, the latter of which as offensive coordinator.
The offense: You essentially spread it out and force the other guys to defend from sideline to sideline, using the entire width of the field to your advantage. Meyer says Mullen understands spacing and the responsibilities of a defense as much as anyone else.
“He’s a guy I’ve seen mature from a graduate assistant to a quarterbacks coach to a coordinator to a head coach,” Meyer said. “He’s a tough guy who has very high expectations for himself and those around him. Some players want to be around that. Not everybody does. But when he meets you, Dan always sees the best in people.
“I always thought UNLV was a diamond in the rough. I couldn’t understand why people couldn’t get it going there. And then Barry Odom comes in and gets that thing cranked up before leaving.
“Right around that time, it was brought to Dan’s attention, and I remember looking in his eyes. And I thought, ‘Man, this would be a great opportunity for him.’”
He has it now with the Rebels. And those who know Dan Mullen best believe the sky’s the limit.
Quarterback U
The list is most impressive. Josh Harris. Alex Smith. Chris Leak. Dak Prescott. Tim Tebow. Kyle Trask.
Quarterbacks who have grown and developed under the tutelage of Mullen.
And all will tell you he can be tough. That he coaches you hard during the week to get the most out of you on Saturdays.
“He believes in you,” said Tebow, the Heisman Trophy winner from Florida. “Young men who listen find out, ‘Wow. I can get better if I listen. I can grow.’ That’s something (Mullen) does exceptionally well.
“When I first got to Florida, he was so hard on us in practice. But we got to the first game, and I put the headset on and it was like, ‘OK, Timmy. You can do this.’ All these encouraging things. I was like, ‘Who is this?’ That’s just part of his mentality. Get you prepared for the moment, for the pressure and obstacles and adversity that hits you in football.”
Meyer tells the story of when the two were at Bowling Green and Harris was the quarterback. A kid who loved the game and was extremely talented. One who Mullen saw something in. Greatness.
“When he shared the vision with Josh, he became one of the greatest players we’ve ever coached,” Meyer said. “There are so many stories like that. Dan sees greatness in people. That’s why I think he relates so well to them.”
Mullen wants a winner at quarterback. Those he has had are all different shapes and sizes, but all have owned a mental toughness that set them apart. All had leadership qualities to winning countless football games. The intangibles you hear about often.
When he as at Notre Dame, Mullen said the defensive coaches were superb. That when they were preparing for a Michigan or USC, all was well and calm. But when they were preparing for a Navy or, say, a Purdue team throwing the ball all around the field, there was a lot of sweating and late nights.
So he and Meyer made note of it all.
“How do we create an offense that encapsulates both the option and that level of passing?” Mullen said. “So we went and studied some out-of-the-box thinkers. A lot of it came from our own mistakes.”
Added Tebow: “When we had the offense at Florida, people said it would never work to have a quarterback run so much. That he’s going to get hurt. But it was about believing in the philosophy and sticking with it. It takes a little courage to do that. He had it at Bowling Green and Utah and Mississippi State and Florida. That’s a really important trait when we talk about his willingness to be different.”
A lifelong fascination
It’s not as if football was his family’s go-to conversation around the dinner table.
Mullen’s father never played in high school. His mother is British and teaches classical ballet.
And yet Mullen was the one who wore a football uniform to career day in kindergarten. Who says the first multiplication table he learned was seven.
Who can’t really explain his lifelong fascination with the game. Only that it has been there from the beginning.
“It was a strange kind of fit, but I always loved every part of it,” he said. “It just always made sense to me. It has been who I have been my entire life.”
Maybe it was his New Hampshire roots.
He is from Manchester, a city on the Merrimack River. It’s one that has produced some the nation’s best football minds, including three whose journeys have overlapped into something special.
Mullen, Chip Kelly and Ryan Day hail from Manchester. Kelly is the former Philadelphia Eagles, San Francisco 49ers and UCLA coach who is now the offensive coordinator under Pete Carroll with the Raiders.
He helped Mullen get into coaching with jobs at Wagner and Columbia.
Kelly then eventually told Mullen that he and Meyer needed to hire Day while at Florida as a graduate assistant. Day would later have stints under Kelly in the NFL before joining Meyer at Ohio State.
Day is now coach of the Buckeyes, who won the national championship in January.
See how it all fit together?
“(Mullen) is a heck of a football coach,” Kelly said. “I’ve known him for a long time. And then when he got the UNLV job, I thought that was a really, really good hire, because I thought Barry Odom did an unbelievable job at UNLV. But I think Danny’s going to do a great job there, and I’m excited to kind of catch up with him in Vegas.”
Kelly also would mention Mullen’s stint in TV.
The time he spent away.
The time he learned a whole lot about himself.
Mullen became a broadcaster in 2022 and worked as a studio analyst and color commentator for ABC and ESPN until landing the UNLV job.
“The reason I came (to UNLV) is because I desperately wanted to be here,” he said. “I wanted to get back in for all the right reasons — the developing of young players, being innovative and creative and having fun while doing it. Making sure I got my mind right.”
But it’s not the same world now. Not with the existence of Name, Image and Likeness dollars and a transfer portal adding more and more names each year.
Not the same at all.
It’s harder, Mullen says, for an old-school coach to develop young players to be successful after football when you don’t know how long they will stick around nowadays. That while wins and and losses stay with you for a short time, the foundation and impact you can make in a person’s life is what drives him.
“I think being able to figure out the balance,” Mullen said. “Coaches are saying, ‘Hey, I recruited you, I found you, I developed this relationship and then, bang, you’re out the door to get a paycheck to go somewhere else. That’s not easy.
“So my thinking is, meet with guys and say, ‘Let’s just focus on one year at a time instead of four to five years. Let’s focus on developing you for a year, and if it leads to you having an amazing opportunity, go do it.’”
His time away allowed Mullen to adjust and see from afar the changing landscape without having to live it on a daily basis. So he returns now understanding there is a new way of doing things.
“After this spring practice, I hope no one leaves, but chances are they will,” he said. “For me as a coach, I just hope they are doing so for all the right reasons.”
A former pupil
Harris, the former Bowling Green quarterback, remembers Mullen as someone who coached you hard and loved on you hard and was the guy you wanted to be in a foxhole with. That there were firm words at times and kind words other times and yet always leading by example.
“The message only works if people are down to receive it,” Harris said. “(Mullen) left the game for a bit, but these kids still know who he is. He’s still very relevant. If you look at his track record, especially with quarterbacks, what can you say?
“You take Mississippi State from the bottom to a No. 1 ranking out of the SEC, a conference with Alabama and Florida and Georgia and Tennessee? Those things aren’t supposed to happen. Coach Mullen really knows what he’s doing.”
Mullen is different now. A different person than he was at Bowling Green or Utah or Mississippi State or Florida or anywhere else. You grow and mature and either get better or worse.
But the standard of hard work remains.
“The world around you is changing, so you end up changing into hopefully the best version of yourself,” he said. “Hopefully, I’m the best version of the coach I can be right now because of all my experience.
“I want to be as hard as I possibly can be during the week so they’re prepared for whatever situation we might face on Saturday. That’s the reward. We’re only promised 12 opportunities next season. And if you do really well, they might give you a few more. So I want to make sure we’re prepared the right way so we can enjoy the reward of playing.”
Community leader
Erick Harper could see the juices flowing from their first conversation.
The UNLV athletic director wanted more than anything else a coach who could keep the train of recent success rolling down the tracks toward more wins and bowl games. He is sure the Rebels have found that person in Mullen.
“He’s a guy who has been there and won at a very high level,” Harper said. “And one who can take our program one step further. We wanted to hire someone of Dan’s caliber. He knows what success is. He was a guy who wanted to coach again and just needed the right spot.”
John Saccenti is the executive director of the Las Vegas Bowl and a good friend to Mullen. Has known the coach since 2008. And is convinced Mullen will fit well into the community.
“His personality fits our community,” Saccenti said. “I’ve seen it firsthand. He’s not coming in completely cold. He established relationships with key boosters and a lot of community leaders several years before he got the job.”
Much of that was done on the golf course alongside Saccenti, who introduced Mullen to many of those same UNLV supporters.
Saccenti describes Mullen as such: Someone who can talk with anybody, who is outgoing and funny and can tell endless stories. That he connects with people. Someone who knows the history of UNLV.
“He knows all about Jerry Tarkanian and what he did,” Saccenti said. “He’s not trying to come in here and be Tark, but I think he really likes the energy of the city and wants to be part of it. He wants everyone to rally behind the program. I’ve been around forever, and I’ve never seen people flock to someone like they have Dan.”
Folks already believe in him.
Now, it’s on Dan Mullen to produce.
The bar has been set with UNLV football.
Contact Ed Graney at egraney@reviewjournal.com. Follow @edgraney on X.
