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Dan Mullen was a head coach in the SEC at Florida and Mississippi State, so he’s well-versed in the conference’s steep tradition.
But before his 2 head coaching stops in the SEC, the former ESPN college football analyst who recently became the head coach at UNLV was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Florida from 2005-08. During 3 of those years, a quarterback named Tim Tebow played under Mullen’s watch, and he played exceptionally well. Well enough, in fact, for Mullen to call Tebow the best player in college football history.
“He’s the greatest college football player in the history of the game. He is because of the resume,” said Mullen during an interview on Wednesday. “If you look at the career he had, I don’t know if you’ll see it ever again. He was there for 4 years, stayed his whole career, right? (He) was a 3-time Heisman finalist, a 2-time national champion … like his accolades, easily you could say he had the greatest career in college football history.”
Mullen also noted, interestingly, that Tebow might not have been the most talented player on some of those Florida teams, with that honor belonging to wide receiver Percy Harvin. But when everything was added up during those Tebow years, Mullen believes he’s the best to ever play on a college football field, all these years later.
Cory Nightingale, a former sportswriter and sports editor at the Miami Herald and Palm Beach Post, is a South Florida-based freelance writer who covers Alabama for SaturdayDownSouth.com.
