Cal State Fullerton Notebook : Titans Allow Elders to Run With His Dream

John Elders had that queasy feeling as he walked into the office of Ed Carroll, Cal State Fullerton athletic director, last July. Elders, the Titans’ cross-country coach, couldn’t imagine why Carroll had asked to see him.

“I thought I was in trouble or something,” Elders said.

No trouble. Carroll told Elders that the university had decided to revive the men’s track and field program, which had been virtually nonexistent since 1981.

And the head coaching job was Elders’, if he wanted it.

The offer was a dream come true for Elders, a Fullerton graduate and a former distance runner at Villa Park High School and Rancho Santiago College. Something in the realm of a sub-4-minute mile--a great challenge, but worth fighting for.

“I vowed to make it a successful program,” he said. “And I’ll work as hard as I can to make it happen.”

If Elders, at 26 one of the youngest Division I coaches in the country, manages to make the Titans’ track and field program a big success, he would be the first. Although Fullerton once had a strong men’s cross-country program, winning the Division II title in 1972, track has been an on-and-off operation in recent years.

In 1975, the men’s track program was dropped when Fullerton became a Division I school. Hurdles were sold and long jump and pole vault pits were torn out to make room for a football field.

(Women’s track and men’s and women’s cross-country have always remained, though none of these programs have had much success in recent years).

In 1981, men’s track was reinstated when Jim Crumpton, a Corona del Mar High School track coach, offered to do some fund raising. After two years, Crumpton left. Since then, men’s track has operated basically as a club sport at Fullerton.

Bob Messina, coach of the UCLA women’s distance programs, spent the 1983 and 1984 seasons coaching at Fullerton. Messina said he has many fond memories of Fullerton, though financial support for the program was always a problem.

“They told me when I went there that there was a $500 budget,” Messina said. “What they didn’t tell me was I was the one who had to raise it.”

For Elders, Fullerton’s future in men’s track appears brighter. Fullerton has granted Elders a $5,000 budget for the 1989 season, a substantial increase from last season.

“Last year we got $236 for men’s cross-country,” Elders said. “That was the exact amount to pay our phone bill.”

Elders, who teaches part time at Fullerton High School, said his coaching salary will increase from $12,000 to $25,000 next year.

But the brightest spot in the Titan track future would have to be the $6.7 million on-campus sports complex. Construction is scheduled to begin this summer.

Along with a 10,000-seat football stadium, the complex will include a 1,500-seat baseball pavilion and a soccer field, an eight-lane, all-weather, lighted track with surrounding bleacher seating for 3,000. The track portion is scheduled to be competed by the spring of 1991.

There are only five all-weather track facilities in Orange County: at UC Irvine, Irvine High School, and Rancho Santiago, Saddleback, Golden West and Fullerton community colleges.

The new Fullerton track should be a great boost to recruiting. As should the ever-enthusiastic Elders and his assistants, Ben Brown and Jim Stuart. Mark O’Brien, a graduate assistant, helps with the distance program.

Brown, a gold medalist in the 1976 Olympics in the 1,600-meter relay and a former NCAA 400-meter champion for UCLA, helped Messina coach the Fullerton program in 1983. He returned when he heard the program was restarting.

Stuart was the Titans’ cross-country coach from 1986-88, and Elders was his assistant. But family commitments forced Stuart to give up the position last year, so Elders took over.

Elders said he has about 40 athletes--20 men, 20 women--signed up for the men’s and women’s track and field teams. Although most of the men are distance runners from the cross-country team, Fullerton will field some quality sprinters, including football players Mike Pringle, Mark Hill and Chip Grant.

Pringle, a junior, was All-City Section in track for Kennedy High School in Granada Hills. Hill, who has 4.6 speed in the 40, was the Bay League 400-meter champion at Santa Monica High. And Grant, a freshman, is said to have the best speed of the three--his 40 speed is listed as “4.5 or less” in the Titan football guide.

But what does Fullerton football Coach Gene Murphy think of his players taking to the track?

“Oh, it’s fine with me, as long as they know where their priorities are,” Murphy said. “First is books, second is football, and third is track. If they can take care of No. 1 and 2 then 3’s OK.

“But if it comes between football and track, it has to be football. They’re on football scholarships here.”

At UC Irvine, track and field Coach Vince O’Boyle is welcoming the Fullerton track and field revival with encouraging words--despite the fact that Fullerton will compete against Irvine in the Big West Conference.

“I think it’s great for track and field in all aspects,” O’Boyle said. “I’m excited about it. It’ll help all of our programs around here to have more competition. I’m happy for them, especially that they have somebody there trying to put it in right direction.”

Perhaps coincidentally, Elders said he hopes to emulate O’Boyle in building the Titan program.

Fullerton has yet to name a search committee for the basketball coaching job. However, some indication of the qualities athletic director Ed Carroll is seeking in a coach can be drawn from the job description that has been posted. The qualifications listed make it clear that a commitment to academics and “desire and ability” to raise funds will be important. Those are two areas in which former Coach George McQuarn was criticized by the athletic department.

Brent Mayne is a year older and 20 pounds heavier this season, and baseball Coach Larry Cochell is expecting a fine season from the junior catcher. He’s also expecting it to be Mayne’s last.

“We won’t have him next year. We know that,” Cochell said. He predicts Mayne will go very high in the June amateur draft, probably in the first round. Mayne hit .393 last season and had a 38-game hitting streak.