Mississippi State’s Mullen Learns How Other Half Wins in SEC
STARKVILLE, Miss. — The road to the Bowl Championship Series title game will wind through the most remote college town in the Southeastern Conference during the next month. By hosting No. 2 Florida this weekend and No. 1 Alabama on Nov. 14, Mississippi State will make cameo appearances in the national championship conversation.
And the drop-ins by the SEC fat cats will showcase for Mississippi State’s first-year coach, Dan Mullen, exactly what he is chasing in one of the most difficult jobs in all of college sports.
When Mullen, 37, was hired by Mississippi State last year after spending four seasons as the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Florida, he traded the Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow for a walk-on quarterback and went to a university with essentially half the athletic budget ($41 million compared with $89 million) and football budget (less than $8 million compared with $15.8 million).
There is even a coordinator in the SEC, Tennessee’s Monte Kiffin, who is scheduled to make $300,000 more than Mullen’s $1.2 million salary this season.
But as Mississippi State has shown pluck and promise by starting 3-4 in Mullen’s rookie year, he has embraced his new home on the other side of the SEC’s financial tracks.
“Maybe people would wonder why you come here, but when I did the research and looked at the talent within a five-hour radius, the vision of the athletic director and a new president, I felt like we could build a winning program here,” Mullen said.
The tale of Mississippi State’s recent football history includes losses (two winning seasons this decade) and N.C.A.A. rules violations. Mullen is in charge of rewriting the narrative.
NYTimes.com
10/23/9
