LAS VEGAS — Dan Mullen questioned whether UNLV had played hard enough Saturday, then made the lack of urgency his responsibility.
“I don’t know if we played real hard,” Mullen said after the Rebels’ 31-24 victory over Northern Illinois. “And that’s really disappointing. That’s on me.”
Mullen meant the physical effort and intensity he expected from his players, particularly on defense before halftime. He said they were trying. He believed they could compete harder and sustain that effort through each play.
“I don’t think we’re playing with the strain we need,” he said.
The criticism followed a bye week spent addressing problems from the Air Force loss. Before Northern Illinois arrived, Mullen had warned that improvement was necessary even from the performances that had produced victories.
“If we’re not playing a lot better on Saturday than we did against Cal and North Dakota State and Air Force, we’re in a lot of trouble,” he said before the NIU game.
UNLV won again at Allegiant Stadium. Mullen still identified missed tackles, missed gaps and failures to get off blocks against a team that entered without a victory. The Huskies gained 493 yards, including 240 rushing yards.
He also believed the offense had failed to take opportunities to put the game away and had lost production to penalties. The extra preparation time had not produced the consistent performance he demanded.
The players were asked whether they had underestimated Northern Illinois.
“We can’t play at any team’s level,” defensive back Mumu Bin-Wahad said. “We have a standard here.”
Mullen had opened his remarks by praising Northern Illinois’s coaching staff for keeping its players competing through an interim coaching situation and a difficult season. He credited the Huskies’ intensity and said their performance reflected their character.
“I can’t give them enough credit,” he said.
Asked what changed defensively after halftime, Mullen said UNLV performed some of its responsibilities better. The tackling, gap assignments and ability to get free of blockers were the specific areas he identified.
He credited veterans with making important plays in the second half, naming Avery Helm and Denver Harris for pass breakups. Bin-Wahad’s interception drew praise and a joke that he would have scored if he were faster.
Bin-Wahad was concerned with more than the interception. Asked about his total, he said he wanted to improve his overall game rather than focus on individual statistics.
Mullen trusted his players’ recognition of decisive situations. The defense understood when it needed a stop, he said, and the offense knew when another first down could finish the game.
“We’ve been in shootouts, we’ve been in close games, tight games, this type of game,” he said. “And, you know, it’s guys stepping up to go make it happen.”
He believed the offense had opportunities to prevent another close finish.
“There were some opportunities to put that game away,” Mullen said. “We didn’t offensively.”
He described fourth-quarter chances to go ahead by 14 and put more pressure on Northern Illinois. The Rebels failed to create that separation, leaving the defense to make another stop.
Penalties particularly frustrated him. The final game report listed six for 80 yards. Mullen cited 75 yards during his remarks and said all six came after halftime. He argued that erased gains made the cost much greater.
“It probably is six for 200 maybe,” he said.
He was estimating the production lost when flags took plays off the board, rather than giving an official total. He called the mistakes awful and said they needed to be cleaned up.
His warning about those errors was blunt: UNLV should not be surprised by how a game unfolds when it keeps making them.
“You got to play really well every single week,” Mullen said.
The run defense drew a question about what the staff could do during the season. A reporter cited almost 700 rushing yards allowed over two games and asked how Mullen would correct the defense without undoing its offseason work.
“We got to play better,” Mullen said.
He called for better play up front and pointed to injuries that had left the staff without players it expected to have when it developed its plans.
“We’re down a bunch of players,” he said.
That explanation had also been part of his assessment after Air Force. Following that loss, Mullen said UNLV had been without its top two defensive tackles. He had criticized the front’s physicality in the second half and wanted players seeking corrections from their position coaches when they returned to Las Vegas.
“I hope our guys are pissed we’re not going back to practice this afternoon when the plane lands,” he said after Air Force.
Safety Jake Pope had rejected injuries as an excuse after Air Force, saying the available defenders still had keys to read and gaps to fill.
Against NIU, Mullen’s dissatisfaction concerned the effort before halftime. The two performances differed in when he thought the defense had fallen short, but both left him asking for more from the front.
He declined to compare the games directly, pointing to UNLV’s pass defense against Air Force. He did not announce a change in scheme or personnel in his answer about correcting the run defense.
The injuries limited the players available. Mullen’s effort criticism concerned the players who were on the field. His answer did not establish what the staff would change to get the tackling, assignments and intensity he expected from that group.
He gave the defense credit for making the plays necessary to win, while refusing to describe its second-half performance as good.
“I don’t know that we played great in the second half,” Mullen said. “But I think we made some stops and plays we needed to make.”
Winning had changed the result from the Air Force game. It had not ended Mullen’s complaints about the work his team was failing to finish.
“Am I pleased with how we played defensively? No,” he said. “I don’t think we played very well defensively, especially the first half, for sure.”
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