Dan Mullen remembers the days as a young coach in the Northeast when he would be called on to fix the technical issues before meetings. Now, a few decades later, Mullen isn’t nearly as technically savvy.
“I’ve become the absolute worst,” he jokes in a Zoom call between himself and the Florida Gators men’s basketball coach, Mike White.
Mullen should be in the middle of spring practice and gearing up for the Orange and Blue Debut but the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a change of course for everyone around the world. Now, Mullen is spending time at home with his wife and children, growing newfound respect for teachers as his children Canon and Breelyn go through virtual classes at home.
“I’m more of an administrative role. I get called in for discipline issues and discipline concerns more than trying to do new math,” Mullen joked. “I don’t know that new math is my thing.”
Just because he isn’t n his office inside Ben Hill Griffin Stadium doesn’t mean he isn’t working. The SEC recently lifted a ban on coaches being able to meet with their players virtually to go over film and have meetings pertaining to football. This means, even though spring practices were scrapped, the coaching staff can still do its best to meet with players and try to get them up to speed.
For Mullen, it has helped to do it virtually, allowing him to be in more places at once.
“I can sit and do my work and I can sit in on all the other position meetings we have,” Mullen says. “With the number of coaches that we have and the number of players we have, to just sit and get work done but in the background, you’re listening to the tight ends meeting, then the linebacker meeting, so everybody has a little bit different schedule, we’re not all at the exact same time with the individual position groups. Its been really beneficial to see how everybody coaches and watches and listens to their meetings.”
Typically a head coach won’t have the time to sit in on individual positions meetings every day. With this new technology and with everything else shut down Mullen is getting a chance to see how each of his coaches goes through meetings, how the players are responding and how his staff and players are interacting, all while in the comfort of his home.
It’s not an ideal situation but Mullen is making the most out of the cards he was dealt, and has even found an advantage.
At the end of the day, the virus will control when football will be back. Most people around college football believe that it will happen sometime this year but it’s not in their control. For now, Mullen and his staff will continue to meet as much as they are allowed by the NCAA and will continue to prepare for the season as best they can.
“We gotta worry about what we can control and not what we can’t control and get better every day,” he said. “I think we’ll look back on it and say we made the most out of the situation.”