Dan Mullen and his staff had a familiar face in town for Friday Night Lights in Ole Miss commit Diwun Black (6-4, 219, Forest High School, Forest Mississippi).
Mullen and most of his staff at Mississippi State have been recruiting Black for a while now dating back to their time with the Bulldogs and that relationship is something Mullen made sure to keep intact when he made the move to Florida.
“When he left to come to Florida he made sure to text me and call me and make sure that he knew I was still wanted,” Black told Gator Country. “We never fell off.”
The Gators weren’t really in the mix for Black with the previous staff but Mullen has made the Mississippi product a priority for his first full season. Black arrived in Gainesville early Friday morning and was immediately greeted by the staff who were awaiting his arrival. It was a red carpet treatment that left Black excited and impressed.
These kind of visits, Black’s first to Gainesville, aren’t just about showing off facilities but it’s also a chance to sit down and go over the playbook and tell prospects how they can and would be used in the defense. Black is a long, rangy player now so Florida laid out how they would use him and even a contingency plan.
“They told me that I’m the safety type but that if I get bigger I could move to linebacker,” he said. “I like the position that they’ve talked to me about. It’s like a Rover type. They play the 3-4 so they kind of just told me my role in the defense.”
Black didn’t come to Gainesville just to see the campus. He wanted to get work in as well. Being an Under Armour All-American, and a player that was named to the Dream Team at The Opening, put a target on his back for some of the other prospects that were camping.
“I loved the competition,” he said. “These people were talking to me telling me that they were gonna get me and I liked shutting them down. I talk and I show them.”
Black also had a chance to work out with Christian Robinson, Florida’s 28-year old linebackers coach.
“It was fun to get some new tips from the linebacker coach (Christian Robinson),” he said. “I learned some new things from him about what you should do and what you shouldn’t do.”
With is senior season coming up Black says he doesn’t have any trips lined up right now but had one game in particular that he would like to be in Gainesville on an official visit to see.
“Once my season starts I’m gonna shut it down and focus on that. I was talking to Coach Mullen about coming and setting up an official visit,” he said. “The LSU game. That’d be the one I wanna get to.”
Black is committed to Ole Miss but told Gator Country that this visit to Florida and getting to meet the staff definitely helped the Gators’ chances at trying to earn a commitment from him. The staff made sure to continue to tell him just how much he’s wanted in Gainesville and that message started to sink in.
“They told me to ‘have fun, have a good time and hopefully I’ll become a Gator.’ That was their message,” he said.
“I feel like I fit in here.”