Former UCLA coach believes Dan Mullen could be exploring his options

Dan Mullen to the NFL? CBS analyst Rick Neuheisel thinks it could happen someday.

During an appearance on Sirius XM College on Thursday, Neuheisel discussed Mullen and Florida after Mullen’s comments on recruiting this week. He also dropped an interesting bit about the Gators coach’s future — and how the NFL could be in his sights down the road.

Rick Neuheisel on @SXMCollege about Florida’s Dan Mullen: “I know Dan & like him & respect him: if he gets an NFL chance I think he’ll take it. I think he’s tired of this (at Florida)”

— Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) November 4, 2021

“I know Dan and like him and respect him,” Neuheisel told Sirius XM. “If he gets an NFL chance, I think he’ll take it. I think he’s tired of this [at Florida.]”

It’s interesting timing for Neuheisel to bring this up. Mullen came under fire this week for comments about recruiting in his Monday press conference. Florida ended up cutting the press conference short and Mullen didn’t speak to the media until Wednesday on the SEC teleconference.

“We’re in the season now,” Mullen said. “We’ll do recruiting after the season. When it gets to recruiting time, we can talk about recruiting.”

Florida is having a rough go of it this year, going 4-4 overall and 2-4 so far in SEC play. The Gators are fourth in the SEC East, but have no chance of winning the division after Georgia locked up the title with handling Mullen’s squad 34-7 last week.

There were some good things to take away from that game, though, considering Florida out-gained Georgia by one yard. The Gators gained more yards than any other Bulldogs opponent this year, but turnovers mounted and Georgia capitalized en route to the blowout victory.

Dan Mullen: Some comments ‘taken way out of context’

Mullen touched on the concern regarding the unavailability of his players to the media during Wednesday’s SEC teleconference.

“There were some people that were concerned about our player availability. On Monday morning, we had an 8 o’clock team meeting,” said Mullen. “We had a great meeting with the team. The energy and excitement of our players going into this final third of the season, and [with] the focus of which we have to take and the approach we have to take in the final third of the season, I felt it was the best for our players was to make sure our focus is completely on the work that we have to do over the final third of the season.

“Because of that, I’ve made myself available for media every single day this week – Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday – because we didn’t have the players available. I just wanted to clarify some of those things that apparently have been taken way out of context the last couple of days.”

Mullen and the Florida Gators haven’t reached their lofty expectations in 2021. Still, the coach remains focused on finishing strong — hoping to lead the Gators to a finish that inspires hope.