ESPN College Football

Posted by ESPN.com's Chris Low

STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Ahh, to be Dan Mullen.

He's 37 years old, making $1.2 million per year and heading up his own program in the best college football conference in the land.

He's coached Tim Tebow and Alex Smith, collected a pair of national championship rings as Florida's offensive coordinator and pretty much won everywhere he's been since quarterbacking Trinity High in Manchester, N.H., to a state championship in 1988.

Now the real "fun" begins.

	AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis
	Dan Mullen takes over a team which was ranked 113th in total offense last season.

Mullen takes over a Mississippi State program that has been an afterthought in the SEC for much of this decade. In seven of the nine seasons since 2000, the Bulldogs have finished either fifth or sixth in the Western Division.

And only four times in the last 20 years have they scratched out a winning record in the SEC.

This ain't an easy gig.

Sylvester Croom found that out after winning eight games in 2007, including the Liberty Bowl, and earning SEC Coach of the Year honors. A year later, he was out of a job.

Croom's undoing was an offense that never really got any better. The Bulldogs were 113th in total offense last season and 115th in scoring offense.

So when Mississippi State athletic director Greg Byrne went looking for a new coach, he was looking for offense. High-octane offense and lots of it.

Enter Mullen, who'd been Urban Meyer's quarterbacks coach at Bowling Green and Utah and then his offensive coordinator at Florida the last four seasons.

While Mullen won't have Tebow pulling the trigger at Mississippi State and Percy Harvin to pitch the ball to on a misdirection reverse, he does have a plan for returning the Bulldogs to relevance again in the SEC.

Much of that plan revolves around getting the best high school players out of Mississippi every year. But there's also an attitude and focus that Mullen is trying to instill, one that he's seeing take shape a little more every day.

With his head-coaching debut three weeks away (Sept. 5 against Jackson State), Mullen weighed in on a variety of topics during a sitdown interview in his office Friday.

You took the job without the benefit of touring the campus. How did your impression of this place change after you first got here?

Dan Mullen: Everything was better than what I thought it was going to be coming here. I had no idea what I was getting into facility-wise, talent-wise, community-wise and school-wise. One thing I knew after meeting with the athletic director (Byrne) was that you had a guy who wanted to win and was very supportive. And then in doing some research, I knew there was tremendous in-state talent, and those were the two things that sold me. My wife had been out here once to cover a golf tournament and said, 'It's a really nice town. I think it gets a little bit of a bad rap, that we're way out in the country.' But it's really not like that.

Do you fight that same perception in recruiting?

DM: When we get kids on campus, most of the reports are when they leave campus something along the lines of, 'I can't believe it was that nice,' or 'I didn't know it would be that nice.' It's not just our athletic facilities. But walk through campus on a school day. Go downtown. It's a great community and just a really nice place to live and a great family atmosphere that revolves around the university. That's what makes it a neat place. The issue we fight is getting kids here. Once they come, they're amazed.

What's the best advice Urban Meyer gave you?

DM: There were so many things, but one of the main ones was to make sure that you be yourself and stick to your guns. Don't change who you are to try and please other people. You have to coach the program your way and with your beliefs. If people don't like it, that's too bad. It's your program and you have to do it your way.

Like Meyer, you're coaching special teams. Have you seen kids buying into that part of the game the way they did at Florida?

DM: As a head coach, you better be involved with special teams. How can you get the kids to fully invest in it, if the head coach isn't fully invested in it? I want to make sure our guys know how important it is to me. Special teams is an effort part of the game. You can win the special teams battle with effort. You don't always need the skill if all 11 guys are giving extraordinary effort. That's something I look for in our program right now, that you can win that third of the game on effort.

What effect did it have on you, coming to Mississippi State from a place like Florida where you had players sitting on the bench that could have started for most of the other schools in the conference?

DM: It just turns your focus to recruiting. To get us caught up, we have to get the players in this state. The state of Mississippi is not lacking for high school talent, and we have a great junior college system in Mississippi. The players are right here. Our biggest challenge is to get them on campus and get us caught up to the talent level of all the other teams.

How was your start this year in getting the recruits you targeted in this state?

DM: I have my own personal rating system, and we got the four best players in the state. I had Fletcher Cox No. 1, Josh Boyd at No. 2, followed by Chad Bumphis at No. 3 and Tyler Russell at No. 4. Those were my top four in the state, the guys we wanted and recruited, and we went 4-for-4.

How much will you miss not coaching Tim Tebow his senior season?

DM: It's kind of a sad deal. I've been with him since day one. I don't get to enjoy it all, watching him finish off what might be the greatest career in college football history. It's a great honor to know that I was a part of it. It's sad that I don't get to be there to see him finish it.

Do you guys still keep in touch?

DM: Oh yeah. We both have busy schedules, but I'd say we speak about once a month.