A near-coaching brawl erupted between Florida and Vanderbilt

Florida head coach Dan Mullen and his Vanderbilt counterpart, Derek Mason, nearly got into a brawl over a call during today’s heated game.

No one would have believed that the Florida Gators and Vanderbilt Commodores would turn into a heated matchup, but it did in more than one way.

How so? The head coaches of both teams nearly squared up at mid-field over a call. That’s right, if you wanted some fire in someone’s belly this Saturday, Dan Mullen and Derek Mason delivered.

With under two minutes to go in the first half, and Vanderbilt eating the Gators for a Tennessee lunch, Florida received the ball after finally getting up the mojo to stop a Vanderbilt drive. The return resulted in two penalties, one for an illegal block in the back, and a personal foul for targeting, both against Florida.

Apparently, the play ticked off both coaches, as ESPN had a tri-screen, showing Florida coach Dan Mullen and his Vanderbilt counterpart, Derek Mason, getting into a heating exchange at each other.

After the penalties were announced, that’s when all hell nearly broke loose:

With Mullen and Mason both pulling their own versions of “hold me back, bro,” it looked like these two head coaches were really going to throw some blows; but in reality, the two were too far apart from each other to do some actual damage.

Both teams raced to the center of the field, but really, it was to hold their head coaches back then to actually fight each other. The near-coaching brawl seemed to put a spark in the Gators, who, after the mass confusion, have rallied off 17 straight points to take the lead 26-21, and have managed to shut down the Vanderbilt offense.

Maybe, just maybe, this was another trick under the sleeve of Mullen, who felt like his team needed a spark after sleepwalking throw the first half. I didn’t think he would have to do it against Vanderbilt, but I’ll take it, nevertheless.