UNLV Rebels Athletic Director Erick Harper Speaks About How He Landed Head Football Coach Dan Mullen

UNLV Rebels athletic director Erick Harper gives details on how head football coach Dan Mullen ended up in Las Vegas.

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When UNLV Rebels athletic director Erick Harper managed to lure Dan Mullen out of the TV studio this offseason and hire him to be the school's head football coach, it sent shockwaves through both the Mountain West Conference and the entire college football world. Immediately, he got to work and did one of the most incredible jobs we've ever seen in the history of the sport at rebuilding the roster through the transfer portal. He now has the Rebels at 3 - 0 heading into a Week 3 bye week, coming off a huge win against a Big 10 foe, the UCLA Bruins.

Not many believed that Harper would be able to pull off this hire. After all, Mullen is a National Championship offensive coordinator whose last head coaching job was in the SEC with the Florida Gators. Nevertheless, Harper did manage to pull it off, and he spoke to UNLV's official website about how everything came together with the deal.

UNLV Rebels Athletic Director Erick Harper On Hiring Head Football Coach Dan Mullen

"Every athletics director is going to have coaching short lists for their programs, but particularly football and men’s and women’s basketball. And I can tell you that Dan (Mullen) and Josh (Pastner) were on those short lists.

Now, do you put all your eggs in one basket? You can’t. You have to have multiple conversations going simultaneously.

It was a plus that I knew Dan a little bit; I’d met him a couple of years ago. And I’ve known Josh since 2004. So having already had some familiarity with them, it was an easier phone call to both guys.

With Dan, the first thing to figure out was if he was ready to get back into coaching [after sitting out three seasons]. Once we started talking football, it was evident that he was excited about getting back into coaching again.

Did that mean it was going to be at UNLV? I didn’t know. But the more we talked, the more he understood our vision and mission to build on the foundation from the previous two years. Playing home games in a $2 billion stadium provides potential recruiting advantages that distinguishes UNLV from others, and he’d be taking over a program that has momentum and energy behind it. The fact this wasn’t going to be a rebuilding situation was exciting for him."

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