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As a former University of Florida football great and All-American cornerback, Keiwan Ratliff is used to having an open invitation to the Gators' football facilities. Since his playing days in Gainesville ended back in 2003 (after which he spent seven years playing professional ball) Ratliff has come back to his old stomping grounds countless times.
Former Florida head coach Will Muschamp made a point to have an open door policy with any former Gator and the tradition continued with Jim McElwain says Ratliff.
“Coach Muschamp allowed me to come and go as I please. Champ, he always took care of me and Coach Mac was the same way.”
But when he recently took a trip up to Gainesville with some of the players he coaches in 7-on-7, Ratliff found a reception even he wasn’t expecting.
“They welcomed us with open arms. They showed the boys a good time. But the key to me was the fact that Coach Mullen walked around with us and showed us everything, he gave us the tour.”
As the 7-on-7 coach, Ratliff always tries to bring some of his players with him to Gainesville “whether they got a chance to play at UF or not, I just bring them up for the experience a lot of times,” so this wasn’t an unheard of practice. What made this particular occurrence unique for the former Gator were the circumstances leading up to it— “This was an impromptu visit. This was a conversation that turned into ‘well can you come up’ and I said yea. So when I was going up to hang out and meet the coaches and everything I hit them back and asked them, I’ve got a few boys I wanna bring up with me, would that be alright? And they said whoever you want to bring, bring them.’”—and the way Mullen and his staff reacted.
On a Friday afternoon of an official recruiting weekend mind you, Ratliff found a staff that had quickly pulled together research on the players he brought with him to have numbers ready and the coach waiting.
What transpired with Mullen, in particular, caught him by surprise.
“I know he had other things going on, but he took his time to make sure that we got taken care of the whole time we were there and that was, not to the kids, that was big for me as a Gator just seeing the head coach that accepting of a former player and whatever he had going on. So it was exciting just for me to see that. And the finer details that they were doing.
I enjoyed myself for the first time at UF like watching and observing my kids.”
Throughout the afternoon Mullen brought in his different position coaches as well to speak to the boys in relation to their position.
Then two weekends ago Ratliff saw another piece of the puzzle fall into place for the culture Mullen is creating in Gainesville with the hiring of former Gators cornerback Vernell Brown as Director of Player Development.
“Now with Vernell going up there; Vernell was coaching 7-on-7, he was my son’s coach. They had practice this Sunday that got cancelled because he got that job, so it was like that made it even better. That was like icing on the cake, like ah now Vernell is the one who’s gonna be reaching out to the former players? This is somebody that I see on a day-to-day basis…so it’s really exciting for me to see some of the changes and things that’s going on in Gainesville.”
The intentional nature of Dan Mullen and his new coaching staff will still have to be put to the test on the field, but for former Gator Keiwan Ratliff, who has seen a championship program, it’s a big step in the right direction.
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