The Colleges : Cal State Fullerton Notebook : Women’s Tennis on Upswing

The Cal State Fullerton women’s tennis team is 12-7 this season. This is a relatively unremarkable record unless you happen to know that Fullerton had won a total of 13 games the past two seasons, or that the team has not had a winning record since it became a Division I program in 1978.

Behind the team’s rise is Brad Allen, the coach who has accomplished this with one eye on the bottom line and one hand on his back.

This is Allen’s third season at Fullerton. He has suffered through dismal 6-22 and 7-21 records. When he was hired, he inherited a $1,300 deficit.

“You know, they just happened to forget to mention the $1,300 during the interview,” Allen said. “I found out about it the first day I was hired. Surprise!”

According to Allen, he also found cliques of players with king-sized egos and undisciplined practice habits. Before he was through the first season, he had kicked off one his best players.

“In a word, it was agony,” Allen said. “The team was segmented. They had something like five coaches in six years. Players were working out on their own. I had come from a very structured background; it drove me crazy.”

Allen, 28, surmised that his problems occurred because Fullerton didn’t have the money for scholarships to attract top-flight players to fit his system.

“I realized my second year that I was trying to make Volkswagens into Ferraris,” Allen said. “The only way to get Ferraris is to buy them.”

So Allen raised funds by having his team set up a fireworks stand and by working concession counters at UCLA football games in the Rose Bowl. The team sponsored four tennis tournaments, had run-a-thons and sold coupon books for tire stores.

Allen was able to pay off the $1,300 debt and began earning enough money to offer something in the way of scholarship aid to prospective players. Nothing extravagant, just books and tuition, but it was a lot more than he had been able to offer in the past.

With it, he was able to attract the likes of:

* Nicole Brechtbuhl, a junior transfer from Fullerton College who plays at No. 1 singles and No. 1 doubles.

* Kelli Moore, a freshman who was an outstanding three-sport athlete at Los Alamitos High School (basketball, softball, tennis). Moore had scholarship offers in each sport, including 10 Division I offers for softball (one from Fullerton). But Allen got her, and Moore plays at No. 3 singles and No. 2 doubles.

* Lanna Hollo, a freshman who plays at No. 5 singles and No. 3 doubles, is one of Canada’s top juniors and was shopping around for a California school when she found Fullerton.

“I don’t think there’s any way we would have got three players of their quality without offering them something,” Allen said.

Allen has been limited in his ability to offer hands-on instruction. Playing on the professional circuit in Europe in the summer of 1982, Allen developed a herniated disk that kept him in bed for a month. An orthopedic surgeon told him that he wouldn’t be able to play sports anymore.

Allen does manage to play a little golf or tennis “for about an hour,” but then the pain starts and he has to stop.

“It’s maddening,” he said. “It’s hard to explain; it’s like losing your arm. I was very dedicated to tennis, playing five hours a day, and then I lost all that. When the doctor told me, I cried.”

Allen, who graduated from Valencia High, coached at Fountain Valley High and then Fullerton College.

He doesn’t have to be playing a sport to feel the pain. During a break in a match this season, he walked onto a court to talk to Jennifer Aafedt (No. 6 singles) when the pain hit.

“I just fell to my knees,” he said. “Poor Jennifer. She was scared to death.”

So Allen is limited to warming up players. This season, he’ll be warming them up before more Division I opponents--17--than any other season. On Saturday, Fullerton will play host to Harvard.

The Fullerton baseball team will return to the site of some not-so-fond memories this weekend when it travels to New Orleans to play in the Busch Challenge in the Superdome.

It was in New Orleans last season that Fullerton was eliminated from the NCAA playoffs, losing to Louisiana State, 7-3.

Fullerton (20-9), ranked No. 12 by Collegiate Baseball magazine and No. 15 by Baseball America, will play LSU Friday, the University of New Orleans Saturday and Tulane Sunday.

Brett Mayne has hit safely in 12 consecutive games and leads the Titans with a .412 batting average. Shane Flores (.358) has hit safely in 25 of 29 games. Mike Ross leads the team in RBIs with 39.

Sophomore pitcher Mark Beck, who started the season at 1-3, is 4-1 in his last five starts with a 1.03 ERA in 43 innings.

And speaking of familiar stomping grounds, Augie Garrido, the former Fullerton baseball coach, continues to raid Orange County’s top talent for his Illinois baseball team.

Garrido, who landed Esperanza’s Jason Moler and Doug Saunders earlier, got Mater Dei’s Larry Sutton, an All-Angelus League outfielder.

“We’ve focused our recruiting in California,” Garrido said. “We’ve built a lot of trust and respect from the players in the area.”

The Fullerton women’s gymnastics team posted an all-time high mark of 188.65 last week in a dual meet against San Jose State. Freshman Lisa Dolan (38.15) and Stacey Harris (37.80) posted personal individual high marks.

Fullerton’s previous high score was 188.45, set in the 1986 Western Regional.

Jim Chaney, an assistant offensive line coach, has resigned to become offensive line coach for Western Michigan’s football program.

Chaney, 26, spent four years on the Fullerton staff, two as an aide to offensive line coach Larry Manfull.

A graduate of Western Michigan, Chaney is the second Fullerton assistant to resign this month. Defensive coordinator Steve Hall resigned to relocate his family in Northern California.