STARKVILLE — The relationship between Bret Bielema and Dan Mullen goes beyond professional courtesy.
Three years ago, the coaches were establishing themselves and leading their schools to New Year’s Day bowl berths. Off the field, they didn’t know each other, but that didn’t stop Bielema from connecting with Mullen during one of the Mississippi State football team’s biggest tragedies.
Bielema, who was then the coach at Wisconsin, sent MSU and Mullen a hand-written letter days after former MSU player Nick Bell, 20, died Nov. 2, 2010, at University of Alabama-Birmingham Hospital after undergoing emergency surgery to treat a form of skin cancer that had metastasized through his body. MSU went through a bye week before having to play No. 1 Alabama the week after Bell’s death.
“You are surprised because you get a lot of calls and you have things that go on,” Mullen said Monday. “You’ve got to try and impact other people, do the right thing, and it does make a difference. He probably doesn’t remember writing the letter, but it did have a impact on me, and that just shows the character he has a coach and how all of us try to live our lives.”
Bielema wanted everybody to know the college football community supported MSU as it dealt with the tragedy.
“I had seen Dan have success,” Bielema said in his local media conference Monday. “I saw an assistant coach take over a program, and I think as a coach you just always look for people you admire the way they do things. I didn’t know Dan at all.”
The men can’t remember if they’d spoken to each other at a function years ago for more than a few minutes when they were beginning their careers. However, Bell’s death and MSU’s grieving was seen at the national level.
Bielema knew that pain and wanted to tell Mullen he felt the program was handling the situation with class and dignity. While Bielema was a football player at Iowa under coach Hayden Fry, he learned his 27-year-old sister, Betsy, had died while doing charity work with underprivileged children in the Seattle area. A snake darted from under a rock and spooked a horse, which threw Betsy, who landed on her head. Bielema discovered the news hours after Iowa beat Michigan in 1990 to help propel it to the Rose Bowl.
“When I had a sister lost the way I did I think when you have to deal with something like that as a human being you naturally have compassion for anybody that’s in that role,” Bielema said.
That same year, Bielema’s mother, Marilyn, was diagnosed with breast cancer and started treatment on a disease that returned 11 years later.
Bielema and Mullen will lead their teams against each other for the first time at 11:21 a.m. Saturday when MSU (4-6, 1-5 Southeastern Conference) travels to Little Rock, Ark., to play Arkansas (3-7, 0-6). When Bielema got the job at Arkansas this summer, Mullen told Bielema how much the letter meant to him, his family, and the Bulldogs.
“What kind of blew me away was I saw (Mullen) at the coach’s convention, I guess it was, back in January,” Bielema said. “I was running through the lobby or whatever and he grabbed me and his wife was with him and he shared with me how much that meant. That was cool. Hopefully that just reinforces what I try to do.”
The MSU football office was flooded with calls from coaches Alabama’s Nick Saban and LSU’s Les Miles to fans calling in their support for the Bell family and MSU. Mullen said Bielema’s letter meant more to him than a short message on the phone. Earlier this week, he called it “a class act.”
Bielema said he saw a story on ESPN’s College Gameday about Nick Bell and saw the cowbell salute vigil MSU fans organized the night Bell passed away and wanted to reach out to Mullen and MSU.
“I don’t know if we were in a bye week or if it was a Friday night special,” Bielema said. “I remember watching it and I’m like, ‘Man, that’s pretty impressive.’ Just sent him a note. It wasn’t a big deal.”
But it was a big deal to Mullen, and it always will be.
“To have somebody in the profession to take the time out from his schedule, didn’t know who I was, not in our conference, to write myself and my team a note was a real class act, and I have a lot of respect for him for doing that,” Mullen said. “Not just respect as a great football coach, with all the Rose Bowls, but as a man to take the time to do that. That left a mark with me. That’ll always stay with me.”
Follow Matt Stevens on Twitter @matthewcstevens.
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