Pringle Hits Books Once More : Football: The Titan running back sets the NCAA record for most rushing yards in two consecutive games.

Mike Pringle sat in the Cal State Fullerton training room Monday, tending to the aches left behind by another bruising performance. At hearing the news, he looked up, incredulous.

“Really?” he said.

Really.

Pringle has a national rushing record. Again.

It isn’t the record. Indiana’s Anthony Thompson saw to that Saturday, rushing for 377 yards to set the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. Division I single-game record, breaking the record of 357 that Pringle shared with Washington State’s Rueben Mayes for one week. Or less than one week, depending on whether you count from the day he got the yardage or from the day he found out about it, after a five-yard statistician’s error was corrected.

Now Cal State Fullerton is happy to announce that--barring any more of the unforeseen circumstances that the past week has seen--Pringle will soon be immortalized in the NCAA record book under the heading, Most Yards Gained, Two Consecutive Games.

He set the record Saturday by rushing for 269 yards against Cal State Long Beach. Combined with his 357 yards against New Mexico State, he had 626 in two games, breaking by one yard the record set last season by Oklahoma State’s Barry Sanders, the Heisman Trophy winner.

At the news of the record, Pringle shook his head.

“They keep coming up with records I don’t know about,” he said. “I just wait till Monday now to find out what I did Saturday.”

This time, what he did Saturday was simply overlooked.

Reporters missed it. Mel Franks, the sharp-eyed sports information director who caught the five-yard error, missed it.

And Titan Coach Gene Murphy and his staff, who took the heat for not sending Pringle back in the game with a chance to break the record against New Mexico State?

They caught it.

“That’s a record, and we went after it,” deadpanned assistant coach Don Morel, who announced the record at Murphy’s weekly luncheon Monday.

Murphy, who has been bothered by the uproar over keeping Pringle on the sidelines, feigned indignation and turned on the sarcasm.

“We want this Pringle incident in the paper,” Murphy said. “We put him back in the game so he could get the record.”

Actually, the coaching staff wasn’t aware of the record during the game. But in revealing it on Monday, the coaches got the best of the local media--on a tip from a Herald-Telephone reporter who noticed the record while researching Thompson’s mark in Bloomington, Ind., and called Morel and offensive coordinator Bill Wentworth, who grew up in Bloomington.

So as another game approaches, here is a synopsis of Pringle’s record saga:

The record could have been his, but Murphy kept him on the sidelines.

The record was his, but he would have to share it.

The record was no longer his at all.

But another record is.

And next week?

Pringle, who Monday was named the Big West Conference offensive player of the week for the fourth time this season, needs 181 yards against San Jose State to break the Fullerton and Big West single-season rushing record of 1,789 yards set by Obie Graves in 1978.

He will be dueling San Jose State’s Sheldon Canley for the national all-purpose yardage championship.

And if he can come up with 312 yards?

He can break Sanders’ record in that esteemed category, Most Yards Gained, Three Consecutive Games.

Titan Notes

Marcus Bell of Etiwanda High School, Joe Bertrand of Verbum Dei High, Michael Bloodworth of Palisades High and Joe Small of College of the Sequoias, formerly of Bolsa Grande High, have signed national letters of intent to attend Fullerton on basketball scholarships, Coach John Sneed said.

Michelle Hennessey of Orange Coast College, formerly of Edison High, Claudette Jackson of Golden West College, Felicia Smith of St. Mary’s Academy, Tiffany Luciow of Apple Valley High and Kelly McClanahan of Palm Desert High have signed letters of intent with the women’s basketball program, Coach Maryalyce Jeremiah said.