Dan Mullen: Florida's special teams was 'disappointing'

Nothing went right for Dan Mullen in the Florida Gators’ 70-52 victory over Samford, despite what the 70-point onslaught might suggest.

Sure, Mullen’s offense was great on Saturday, but that only tells half the story. Mullen, just one week removed from an embarrassing, 40-17 loss to the South Carolina Gamecocks, fired both his defensive coordinator, Todd Grantham, and his offensive coordinator, John Hevesy, after the Gators fell to 4-5. Against lowly FCS Samford, the defense looked arguably worse than it did under Grantham, and the offensive line — which was able to prevent Emory Jones from being sacked — still contributed to Florida’s season-high 12-penalty total.

On top of all those struggles, Florida had a few new ones arise in a mediocre performance — notably, the special teams play, which declined substantially. Mullen’s unit let Samford return a kickoff 98 yards for a touchdown; later in the game, they allowed Samford to regain possession on an onside kick.

“The onside kick was disappointing,” Mullen said. “And again, it’s guys making plays. We walked into the huddle and said, ‘they’re going to onside kick right here.’ Now, they hadn’t done that all year, so I didn’t know if it’s going to be in the middle or to the side … We said, ‘hey, we’ve got to be ready for the surprise onside kick here.’ We moved guys up, told them to be ready for the surprise onside kick and had three guys there, and we didn’t get the ball. And that goes into guys making plays. We put a lot of young guys on the kickoff coverage team, because I wanted them to get some experience. I think the kickoff return for a touchdown, obviously, was disappointing. But there’s a lot of guys in there, and I think we kind of bottled it up and should’ve had two guys on the outside. They got out of position, and he broke free and ended up scoring.

“We’ll learn,” Mullen said.

Disappointing play, as Mullen summed it up, resulted in a rather disappointing win. All the while, in the last couple weeks, Florida lost a couple commits and had recruits tweeting at one another not to consider Mullen’s program. Then, after all the disappointment, Mullen only made matters worse his postgame press conference and in his team’s celebration of a lousy victory.

Mullen, Florida receive criticism after win

With all that’s transpired in the past few months, Mullen continues to receive plenty of criticism from fans and media alike. He hears all of it, but as he clarified after the Samford win, it doesn’t bother him — because at the end of the day, he’s his own biggest critic.

“The criticism — the criticism is the criticism. You know, no one is going to be harder on me than me,” Mullen said after Florida beat Samford. “I want to win. I love the Gators. And I love winning. I love competing, I think you guys know that. I’m a competitor, and I want to win. And there’s nobody that’s more disappointed in the team — not just in the wins and losses. There’s nobody more disappointed when we don’t perform and live up to the Gator standard and the expectation than me. And I know a lot of people think that, but I’ve got to tell you, last week’s game (a 40-17 loss to South Carolina) — that was disappointing. I was disappointed in our performance and how we were.”

Mullen’s team did muster an unbelievable 70-point performance, thanks to 717 yards of total offense; quarterback Emory Jones threw for 464 yards and six touchdowns, completing 28 of his 34 pass attempts, while running for 86 more yards and another touchdown. The Gators offense was incredible — but the defense was downright embarrassing. Mullen’s Gators let Samford break all sorts of records on Saturday, including the highest-ever point total for an FCS team against a Power Five opponent. The Bulldogs even held a 42-35 halftime lead, the most points Florida has ever allowed in a single half.

Florida gave up 530 yards of total offense, including 400 passing yards to Samford quarterback Liam Welch. In addition to Welch, wideout Montrell Washington was the offensive star for Samford. He had three scores: a one-yard touchdown run, a 23-yard touchdown catch and a 98-yard kickoff return for a touchdown. He finished with 10 receptions for 124 yards.

“So, the criticism is the criticism, and you know what? My self-criticism is probably a lot worse,” Mullen continued. “Mine was probably enough on that and I didn’t need to look at anybody else’s.”