ESPN college football analyst Dan Mullen has been listed as a potential candidate for several vacant head coaching jobs as of late. One school with a coaching vacancy, James Madison, likely isn’t in the running for Mullen considering he doesn’t even know what conference they play in.
Mullen tweeted out his predictions for each Conference Championship game this weekend. Most of the predictions were reasonable, but his prediction for the Conference USA title game was incredibly inaccurate.
The Liberty Flames faced off against the New Mexico State Aggies on Friday for the Conference USA Championship. But instead of making a prediction for that game, he predicted that James Madison, not Liberty, would defeat New Mexico State in the game.
— Dan Mullen (@CoachDanMullen) December 2, 2023
There are obviously several inaccuracies involved in this. First of all, James Madison is in the Sun Belt Conference. Secondly, the Dukes aren’t even eligible for conference championship play due to their transition to Division 1 before the 2022 season.
Even if Mullen didn’t know which conference JMU plays in, you would think that Mullen would at least be aware of JMU being ineligible for conference championship play considering his analyst role at ESPN. It has been a pretty widely discussed topic on all major networks, considering the Dukes were undefeated for much of the season before their Week 12 loss to Appalachian State. (They will at least be able to play in a bowl, as there were not enough traditionally-eligible teams for the number of bowl slots.)
To be fair to Mullen, he was at least in the right state. Liberty and JMU both reside in Virginia. But it is still a prediction that many fans corrected him for on social media.
NMSU is playing Liberty coach
— The Trashfather ™ (@TLandshark) December 2, 2023
JMU isn't even in the same conference as New Mexico State
— 🏆 ꓘƆAᗺ 2 BACK 🏆 (@tim913) December 2, 2023
New Mexico State is playing Liberty,
— Rudy Jones (@Rudyscribe) December 2, 2023
