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UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA FOOTBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

November 30, 2019

Dan Mullen

Gainesville, Florida

Florida 40, Florida State 17

DAN MULLEN: Good day for us out there today. Talking to our guys, talking about finishing, finishing the right way, the effort. I loved that. I thought we played with great effort. At times we were a little sloppy execution-wise, but I thought we played with great effort the entire day.

A great season. Every one of our guys, a heck of a year for us. You look, beat the Semi's, Miami, two games against instate rivals. Not many are doing that on top of an SEC schedule. For our guys to have the mental and physical toughness the end of the year was fantastic.

The way we finished that game I thought was fantastic. All the way to the final whistle, we were competing, playing, going hard. Not worried about anything, but as hard as we could go on the next play. I thought that was great.

Obviously I want to thank all the Gator fans, Gator Nation. You've heard me say it over and over. If we pack the Swamp, we'll win. Not we win, we'll pack the Swamp. Doesn't work that way.

If you look at our fans, what they were able to do every year. Crowd was unbelievable, every game was unbelievable. Gave us that home-field advantage. Lo and behold, we got undefeated at home. That's really special. I thank the Gator nation. To go do that, follow through with that, so...

Right now our coaches get ready to head out, hit the road recruiting. Players get to go wrap-up final exams. We'll find out where we go here hopefully in a couple weeks, right? We get to see that. Never know how that's going to play out.

Hopefully did enough to get in a New Year's six bowl. Maybe more. Baylor beat a six-win team last week, jumped up five spots. We did the same today pretty handily. We'll see how that works.

Q. What do you think you've accomplished regarding the bowl?
DAN MULLEN: We're 10-2. We played a tough non-conference schedule. I mean, it's going to determine a lot. You look, say, we went out to aggressively schedule two Power 5 teams non-conference. I mean, there's a lot of teams not doing that.

Unfortunately we lost two games by a total of 21 points to the two teams right now that are in the top four in the country.

I don't know. I mean, again, I don't know the discussions that happen in the room and all that stuff. Rï¿½sumï¿½-wise, I think we have a pretty solid rï¿½sumï¿½ to be a top-10 team.

Q. The 2019 class, when you see so many of those guys that stuck around, what does that message send for the program?
DAN MULLEN: I think it's really special to me. I know when you come in and we didn't recruit you, but this is how we're going to run the program, this is what we believe in, this is how the program should be run in the future. Though guys believed and bought in.

I thanked every single one of them. I said, Thanks for believing in me. They played hard for the Gators, but they game here to be Gators. They also believed in me and bought into what me and the coaching staff, what we're trying to build here, how we run our program. I'm very thankful for them to believe in me. It's a great honor for guys to do that.

Q. What does it mean to be 3-0 against your state rival since you got here? How does that help the program, the brand, recruiting?
DAN MULLEN: Obviously winning always helps the brand. Recruiting, I don't know. I've never known that those are huge deals, you know what I mean? The fact that we're winning games, that we have the opportunity to compete for SEC and national championships, get to play in the SEC is a huge recruiting boost.

I think being one of the top 10 public universities in America, the only SEC team that is. Only school in the state of Florida that is. To have the academics, all of that helps in recruiting more than just winning those individual games.

But I know it's great. It's great for the Gators. Great for us. Any time you win in-state rivals, those are neighbors, people I'm getting up to go to church with tomorrow. A lot of orange and blue in church. That's when you go to New Year's Eve parties, Christmas parties, holiday parties, get to wear the orange and blue, have a lot of pride. Those are bragging rights for your neighbors. Out at the club, hitting some golf balls.

We have several rivals here. When you win the in-state ones, it gives everybody bragging rights for a year. It's a lot of fun.

Q. There was a sneak peek of the new football complex tonight. What is that going to mean?
DAN MULLEN: That's going to be huge for us. There's so much to it. I could sit here and talk to you for 45 minutes about the importance of it, every way it's going to affect our program in every aspect. There's a lot.

Number one, to me, the ultimate one is development of players. That's going to be a huge help for us to develop the players. I think people get ooh'd and aah'd by some of the pretty parts. But the player development aspect of it is going to be so huge for us in the future.

Q. Is that about as perfect of a Senior Night as you can ask for?
DAN MULLEN: Oh, I'm pretty critical, so there are a lot of little things we could have done better.

For our seniors, I think it went really well. Got touches, you know. We made a concerted effort. I know it's always a big deal. I really love what our four senior wideouts have done this year. That's why I made a concerted effort they all played on the first play of the game so they could go get that start. They officially started because they played the first play of the game. Just the unselfishness of a lot of guys or our team.

I was pleased a lot of guys had big nights. But not perfect. Tommy didn't get a rushing first down. Probably there's some things that could have gone better.

Q. Freddie Swain, what happened?
DAN MULLEN: He tweaked his knee. It was one of those that he could push through, could have gone in the second half. We have a bowl game coming up. It was one of those that he could make it worse if he went.

We shut him down. We fully expect him to be able to go in the bowl game. That's why we shut him down at halftime.

Q. What ways do you think this team helped move this program forward?
DAN MULLEN: You look at last year, we had a really good year last year, winning nine regular-season games. I don't think we won it in the same fashion we did this year. I think you look at how this team won, how we won big games. We had a tough schedule. We played some tough road games we had to go play, how we competed. I thought they took a huge step forward.

Q. Where was the culture when you got here and how hard is it to change a culture? Where are you in that process now?
DAN MULLEN: Well, the culture, I don't know. I don't judge it. I just knew what we were going to build, what we were going to establish. I told everybody that.

How have people improved? I never judged. I tried not to watch any film. Honestly, I tried not to even to look at a lot of records and issues. Guys maybe had discipline or academic issues, maybe guys were great. I wiped all that out in my first meeting. I came in and said, This is what we're going to do, we need you guys to buy in.

Really they have. I've been really pleased with how the guys have bought in and the success we've had. Hopefully we continue to build that going into the future.

Q. If you had a 24-month calendar, is this where you planned on being at this point?
DAN MULLEN: Sure. I don't know. The hard part about that, I mean, obviously I'd love to have been 29-0 for me personally.

When you look at this, I'm very pleased with where we are, right? I got here, we had a team that kind of bought in, had a successful year last year. Guys continued to buy in. I thought we were better this year than last year.

Am I pleased with that? Absolutely, because that means we're heading in the right direction, heading where we want to go.

Success? You come into the season, what record would make a successful season. The ultimate thing that would make a successful season is do we continue to improve, do we continue to play hard from the first game to the last, are we a better team at the end of the year than the beginning of the year.

This team had to deal with so much adversity, so many injuries, so many other things. I think we were a better team at the end of the year, so it was a very successful year. We got another game.

Q. With the legacy that this senior class has had, how fitting is it, snapping the streak against FSU at home, a lot of seniors made an impact tonight and on this program?
DAN MULLEN: I think it's huge. I guess we snapped a streak against them last year there, then we snapped a streak against them this year here. I think that's pretty special for these guys.

We won 20 games the last two years. That shows a lot for what these guys are. They came in the year before, won four. That's not why they came here. These guys bought into what we were doing. They came in here to live up to that Gator standard, play in great bowl games, compete for championships. They've set the foundation for us to continue to do that in the future.

Q. Talk about the defensive effort.
DAN MULLEN: I loved how we finished. We got a little sloppy. The opening drive, they played trick play, trick play, trick play, trick play. The second half kind of hit a quick lull in there defensively. But we came out and finished strong.

I talk to our guys. I talk about finish, finish, finish, finish. Let's finish the workout, finish the drill, finish this. Let's finish the season the right way. We did that all the way to the final play of the game.

Q. Freddie Swain, has anybody come farther than that guy?
DAN MULLEN: He's done a great job. Great leader for us, energy. Those guys have really set an example of what it is to be unselfish football players. I don't know what the stats show. I don't have them all in front of me. But if I did it by position, you combine those numbers, those are some big numbers that are put up.

We have an unselfish group. A lot of them are split in half. You look at the unselfishness of those guys, what they've been able to do, it sets a great example for guys in the future.

If you're a young player, you look at those guys, those are guys that you want to look up to. They're all going to have an opportunity to play football at the next level. They understand that stats are less important than how hard you play and your performance on the field.

What am I doing every snap on the field, playing at an extremely high level. When I do that, I have an opportunity to have a great future playing this game. They're a great example for young guys.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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