Dan Mullen reveals why UNLV was right job to leave ESPN, return to coaching

Following his departure from Florida in 2021, Dan Mullen jumped into the media world at ESPN. Though his name came up in multiple coaching searches, he stayed put – until UNLV came calling.

Mullen is three games into his tenure with the Rebels, most recently getting a victory over UCLA at Allegiant Stadium. He inherited a team that won 11 games a year ago and was knocking on the door of a College Football Playoff berth with a Mountain West title game appearance.

It took the right opportunity for Mullen to leave the booth, where he called games alongside Matt Barrie. While other calls came, UNLV stood out, and it proved to be the right time to return to coaching.

“Obviously, left Florida, not how I want to finish my coaching career,” Mullen told Jim Rome. “Go over to ESPN. I had a good time calling ball. … I’d go and call the game and they were like, ‘Hey, you know about football?’ I’m like, I could probably figure it out. And no, we had a great time, great people. Some fun crews. … You have to have the right deal. So all of a sudden, last year, had a couple of reunions. You had the 10th year anniversary of Mississippi State being one. Alex Smith, who I coached, got in College Football Hall of Fame. You get around all the players, and they talk about, coach, all the impacts you make on their lives.

“And then it starts to hit you. Now, listen, I miss the ballpark, being around the coaches, the staff, all of that stuff. But really, the biggest part, when you get around the players and they talk about, ‘Coach, you made such an impact on our lives.’ Nothing against what I was doing at ESPN, I really wasn’t making making an impact on anybody’s life. So I had that juice, had that energy. But it had to be the right job.”

Why UNLV was ‘right situation’ for Dan Mullen

While he was in the broadcast booth, Dan Mullen found himself getting into the game. His colleagues noticed it, too, which is why there was an allure to return to the sidelines at some point. But he didn’t want to rush it.

As he looked at the UNLV job, it offered everything Mullen wanted. The program was on the rise after Barry Odom’s tenure and plays in the same stadium as the Las Vegas Raiders. Add in an investment in facilities and the ability to sell Las Vegas in recruiting, and he saw a perfect match.

“We’d go call a game on a Thursday night game, and those guys be looking at me and I’d get going,” Mullen said. “They’d see the fire and you just like, hey, you kind of missed that part. But it always had to be the right situation. UNLV is such a unique job. … When I looked at things, one, I wanted to come in. I want to have to start from scratch. UNLV won 11 games last year, play at Allegiant Stadium. Didn’t have to come in and build a stadium. We have unbelievable facilities. … The facilities are unbelievable. The Fertitta family put a lot of money in the football, the Fertitta Complex.

“So I was looking at different jobs and I’m like, every job that came up over the last three years, I was trying to talk myself into good reasons to go. UNLV, I was trying to talk about, give me the bad reasons to go. And I’m like, okay, we have facilities. We can win a championship. If we win the Mountain West championship – heck, Boise State got a bye last year. We got to buy and we’re in the playoffs. And I can recruit here because it’s Vegas.”