Gators players stand behind Mullen
GAINESVILLE — Calls for sweeping changes in Gators’ football, including the head coach, are irrelevant to those who will have the biggest impact on Dan Mullen’s future.
Florida’s players remain behind Mullen entering a critical three-game closing stretch. Another loss to an overmatched opponent could force a change at the top and a program reset.
The Gators (4-5, 2-4 SEC) plan to make it a moot point, beginning with Saturday’s visit from FSC foe Samford (4-5). A Nov. 20 trip to struggling Missouri (4-5, 1-4 SEC) and Nov. 27 matchup in the Swamp against rebuilding rival Florida State (3-6) are eminently winnable games and potentially crippling losses.
“These next three games are really important,” said linebacker Mohamoud Diabate, a junior with a team-leading 74 tackles. “Getting ready to turn it around. This is a great opportunity for us to really go out there and show our max and roll it into next year. That’s what we’re talking about.
“We’re going to win these next three, hopefully, win a bowl game and just keep rolling from there until I leave.”
Diabate aims to play the 2022 season for Mullen.
A two-year starter, Diabate and other veteran teammates value their head coach’s competitive nature, intelligence and dedication.
“If he was in shape,” senior tailback Dameon Pierce said with a laugh, “and he was allowed to do it, he would put these pads on and go to war with us and play right with us and get his nose in the ballgame. He’s that competitive.
“He loves football.”
In his fourth season with Mullen and sixth playing college football, offensive lineman Stewart Reese has a unique perspective having spent two seasons with him at Mississippi State (2016-17) and the past two seasons at Florida.
“Personally, I wouldn’t take nobody else but Coach
Mullen,” Reese said.
Reese will be gone, but based on history expects Mullen to turn around the Gators.
Reese, 23, recalled the 2016 Bulldogs, who won just five regular-season games before slipping by Miami Ohio in the St. Petersburg Bowl. Mississippi State won nine games the next season, Mullen’s ninth and final one in Starkville.
“This isn’t the first time I’ve been part of a season like this,” Reese said. “The biggest thing about Coach Mullen that makes him the person for the job is that he’s a competitor. Regardless of what’s going on, regardless of how bad it gets, he’s just going to keep plugging and plugging and plugging away until it gets better.”
Diabate sees Mullen’s dedication morning, day and night.
“I like playing for Coach Mullen just because the obsession he has with football,” Diabate said. “Sometimes I might pull up at night. I might have forgot something. I see his Mercedes there. He’s working. It might be a Sunday. I see his Mercedes there, working.”
Yet there are questions about Mullen’s commitment to Florida based on his subdued tone after losses, vague explanations for his team’s struggles and low-energy body language. The Gators’ recruiting struggles — the 2022 class ranks ninth in the SEC, per 247Sports — poses a headwind to a long-term turnaround.
The firings of defensive coordinator Todd Grantham and offensive line coach John Hevesy were viewed by many as Mullen deflecting blame or buying time.
“Coach Mullen makes his decision off what he feels like is best for the team,” Diabate said. “He made the decisions that he felt like were necessary to spark the defense, spark the offense. So far in practice we definitely have different sparks and more juice.”
Diabate also dispelled the growing narrative that Mullen has lost the locker room.
“Nobody [skipped] practice. Nobody hit the [transfer] portal,” Diabate said. “We’re all here ready to work. I don’t see anybody wavering.
“I see everybody strong and ready to finish the season strong.”
At this point of a disappointing season, the Gators’ support of their coach falls on deaf ears without results. During the next three Saturdays, Mullen and his players have the chance to have the final word.
“One thing that I’ve learned in six years of playing college football,” Reese said, “is they’re gonna praise you when you’re up and they’re going to kick you in the ass when you’re down. Sorry for my French, but it is what it is . ... It doesn’t matter what everybody else has to say.
“We got to do what we need to do for our coach to make sure that we finish out the season the right way.”