What took place within the UF football program over the last two weeks more closely resembled an anointing than a coaching search.
Athletic director Scott Stricklin relieved Dan Mullen of his head coaching duties on Nov. 21. Two days later, he met with Louisiana coach Billy Napier in his Lafayette home. Five days after that, he was officially announced as Florida’s next coach. On Sunday, he arrived for his first official day on the job and was formally introduced to Gator Nation.
Stricklin never talked with any other coaches, and Napier never showed much interest in any opening except for Florida’s.
The quick-paced nature of this coaching search prompts some fair questions. Did Stricklin do enough research on Napier to fully understand what he’s getting in him? How can Stricklin be sure that he hired the right person for the job if he didn’t interview any other candidates?
Well, Stricklin eased any concerns at Napier’s introductory press conference on Sunday evening. Even though this hire came together quickly, Stricklin didn’t rush through the process. In fact, he’s been impressed with Napier for several years now.
Stricklin served a three-year term as member of the College Football Playoff committee from 2018-20. Each of the committee members are assigned a couple of conferences to study closely and report to the other committee members on. One of Stricklin’s conferences was the Sun Belt, home of Napier’s Louisiana team.
Stricklin was impressed with what he saw out of Napier’s program. So, after he fired Mullen, he immediately did advanced research on Napier in the form of reading articles, watching videos and talking to people who know him.
“I kept hearing certain descriptions over and over again, words like ‘genuine,’ ‘authentic,’ ‘organized,’ ‘detailed,’ ‘disciplined,’ ‘methodical,’ ‘caring,’ ‘competitive,’ ‘hardworking,’ ‘thoughtful,’” Stricklin said. “If you think about all those words, for us to reach the high expectations shared by everybody who loves the Gators – and we talk about championship experience with integrity – to have consistent and sustained success, those are the traits that are going to be imperative. And somebody who understands that and can lead in that manner were going to be really important.
“I was talking to a coach who was just giving me advice, a successful coach, and he said, ‘There’s those that think the players and the staff are there for them and those who think they’re there for the players and the staff.’ I think [Napier’s] a guy [that] he thinks he’s there for all these other people including the players, and he wants as much support around that to help them be as successful as possible.”
Stricklin’s research caused him to quickly identify Napier as his No. 1 target, which led him to Napier’s home just a couple of days later.
“I told him, I said, ‘You’re trying to win a game this week,’ and this was two days before Thanksgiving,” he said. “I said, ‘We’re going to have to have some more conversations, but I want you to know that my goal is for the net result of all these conversations is you’re going to accept the head coaching position at the University of Florida.’ And he sat up and goes, ‘Well, all right. Let’s do it.’ So, he would do his job during the day, and, at night, we would get on the phone and have more conversations.”
Of course, those conversations quickly resulted in Stricklin presenting Napier with an offer.
Napier had reportedly received some interest from Power Five schools in the past, including SEC programs Auburn and South Carolina, but had turned them down. Loyalty and honor are two characteristics that Napier prides himself on, and he felt like he hadn’t accomplished everything that he had pledged to do at Louisiana.
His decision to turn down other jobs had more to do with wanting to win an outright Sun Belt Championship than it did anything other schools did or didn’t do.
“I didn’t feel like we had done our job yet at the University of Louisiana,” Napier said. “We were able to win the Western Division, get in the championship game, came up short a few times. The third year, we’re in position to compete for the championship. We’re playing Coastal Carolina, and the rug gets pulled out from underneath us right there at the end [due to COVID].”
This season, the Ragin’ Cajuns accomplished enough that Napier could feel at peace with leaving.
“This year, I felt like we were in position to do the job,” he said. “We were literally one week away from the championship game, I think, when we came to an agreement. So, I think you’d felt that you’d done your part, right? The people hire you to do a job. You’ve got a contract. You want to fulfill your contract. You want to follow through on your word, and then you combine that with what I would say is a very unique timing situation at the University of Florida.
“It’s the right place at the right time with the right people and the right leadership, and I’m extremely thankful for the opportunity.”
When Stricklin addressed the media two weeks ago following Mullen’s firing, he identified three things that he was looking for in the next coach.
“Number one, someone who could identify and recruit the right people for Gator football, and that’s both players and staff,” Stricklin recalled on Sunday. “Someone who could take those individuals and build relationships through personal attention, organization, discipline, hard work, and then bring those people together, bring that group together to form a productive football program.
“And, third, put all those individuals in a position to be successful, obviously on the football field, but also beyond that, in life in general. So, those are the three things we wanted – somebody who could bring the people together, can lead them and then can do all the things you have to do to run a successful program.”
It only took one week, but Stricklin found all of those things in Napier.