Dan Mullen fires back at Florida fans: 'I don't know anyone more motivated to win'
After losing to LSU in Week 7, Florida head coach Dan Mullen might be feeling a little bit of heat. The Gators have three losses on the season. The first was a 31-29 defeat against Alabama, and the other was a 20-13 loss at Kentucky. In a press conference on Monday, Mullen responded to some criticism he has seen from Florida fans, saying that nobody is more motivated to win than he is.
“First off, I don’t know that there’s anybody more motivated to win than me,” Mullen said to reporters on Monday. “And I know the Gators fans everywhere, they’ll sit there and probably every person on the screen is like, ‘Oh boy I want the Gators to win way more than he does.’ I don’t think that’s the case. So, I think the aspect of it looking from the outside in, you sit there and say, ‘I’m the biggest fan, I want us to win more than anything else.’ Well I’ll tell you what, the coaches, the players, people within the program that put in the work every single day year round, I want to win football games.
“You look in perspective of it, you’re always keeping perspective of where you are. And to me, that is are we improving, are we worrying about what we can control? Yeah, I’ve had one undefeated season as a coach. We didn’t get to play for a national championship that year. I don’t know what else we could have done. What you can control is what you can control. Won two national championships and we’ve lost games, and got I guess voted into going to play for those during my coaching career.”
Mullen to Florida fans: The motivation to win is huge
Mullen went on to talk about how teams prepare year round to go play 12 games. While some fans might not see that, Mullen is adamant about the amount of preparation he and Florida put in to try and win those 12 games.
“So, I think when you look at those things you just put it in perspective,” said Mullen. “Which is are we getting better, how are we getting better, are we excited to compete. We only have so many opportunities to compete each year. We work year round for 12 opportunities to compete. If you do well in those 12 they give you 13, 14, maybe even 15 depending on how you do. The motivation and the desire to go win each one of those is huge because you have so few opportunities to do it.”
Mullen is in his fourth season at Florida. The Gators went 10-3 in Mullen’s first season in 2018 and won the Peach Bowl. In 2019, Florida went 11-2 and won the Orange Bowl. Last season, Mullen led the Gators to an 8-4 record but lost in the Cotton Bowl. With three losses already and a matchup against Georgia looming, the Gators have a lot of work to do to right the ship this season.