Dan Mullen agrees to four-year extension with Mississippi State Bulldogs

Mississippi State University wisely decided to extend head football coach Dan Mullen on a four-year deal to keep him in Starkville.

The second-longest tenured coach in the SEC doesn’t look to be going anywhere anytime soon. That’s right, Mississippi State University has agreed to a four-year extension with head football coach Dan Mullen.

Mullen has been with the Mississippi State Bulldogs football program since 2009. He has led the Bulldogs to a 61-42 (29-35) record in eight seasons in Starkville. Mullen has led Mississippi State to seven straight bowl games, a school record.

This extension for Mullen runs through the 2021 NCAA season. He will make $4.5 million for the 2017 NCAA season. Mississippi State may have only gone 6-7 last season, but do keep in mind that this was the first season in Starkville sans Dak Prescott.

While Prescott was taking the NFL by storm as the spectacular rookie quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys, Mullen had to deal with missing game-winning field goals at home to the South Alabama Jaguars and the up-and-down nature of first-year starting quarterback Nick Fitzgerald.

Well, Mississippi State would upset then No. 7 Texas A&M and beat arch rival Ole Miss in Oxford to win the Egg Bowl and go bowling. Fitzgerald improved as the season progressed and so did the Bulldogs.

For historically a bottom-feeding SEC football program, Mullen has brought stability to the Mississippi State program since Jackie Sherrill was its head coach. Mullen is only 12 wins away from tying Sherrill for most wins in school history at 75.

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Winning in the SEC West with the likes of the Alabama Crimson Tide, the Auburn Tigers, and the LSU Tigers annually is hard. It hasn’t been easy, but Mullen has proven to be one of the better head coaches in the SEC.