COLLEGE NOTEBOOK : Long Beach’s Allen All Ears in Scouting Northridge

Among those who apparently could not find a seat at North Campus Stadium last week was George Allen, the 72-year-old, first-year football coach at Cal State Long Beach, Cal State Northridge’s opponent Saturday.

Allen was seen standing behind the Northridge bench during the game against Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Well, actually he was reportedly leaning--so as to listen in as Mark Banker, CSUN’s defensive coordinator, plotted adjustments during the game.

From all indications, Allen and the 49ers are taking the nonconference game against Northridge very seriously. And with reason.

It is a nonconference game and the Division I 49ers are heavy favorites over the Division II Matadors. But Long Beach needs victories in its final two games against CSUN and Nevada Las Vegas to finish with a winning record.

Perhaps equally significant, Allen has a personal streak going.

The former coach of both the Rams and Redskins never had a losing season in 14 years in professional football. As a college coach, Allen was 49-33-7 at Morningside College (1948-50) and Whittier College (1951-56).

A losing record this season would be Allen’s first since Whittier finished 3-6-1 in 1954. That was also the year in which Allen last scouted a college game. Before last Saturday, that is.

Getting offensive: Freddie Bradley of Moorpark College and Jeff Barrett of Santa Monica have been selected as the Western State Conference co-offensive players of the week.

Bradley, who is averaging more than 210 yards rushing a game, gained 279 yards in 37 carries and scored five touchdowns in the Raiders’ 49-29 win against Santa Barbara.

Barrett, a 1988 graduate of Burroughs High, completed 23 of 36 passes for 296 yards and three touchdowns in Santa Monica’s 47-28 victory over Pierce.

Domino effect: Every time Bradley begins rolling, records start to fall.

With five touchdowns and 32 points last week, Bradley set a school single-game scoring record and pushed his season scoring total to 148 points, surpassing Mike Crawford’s 1982 total of 140.

Bradley also moved up on national lists. He ranks second in career all-purpose rushing yards, in a dead heat with Estrus Crayton of Rancho Santiago, who has 3,751 yards. With two games remaining, Bradley is less than 400 yards from the career all-purpose running mark and less than 500 yards from the single-season all-purpose running record.

Bradley has 1,686 rushing yards to rank 12th, five yards behind Blaise Bryant, formerly of Golden West, on the single-season list. His 2,952 career yards places him eighth on that list.

Statwatch: Tailback Albert Fann of Northridge will need some help to break the 1,000-yard rushing barrier this season. Fann needs 82 yards to reach 1,000, but he is not expected to play in CSUN’s regular-season finale against Cal State Long Beach. Northridge will have to make the playoffs for Fann to get another shot. In addition, Fann needs 80 yards to move into 17th place on the NCAA Division II career rushing list. Fann has 4,090 yards. Johnny Bailey, who played for Texas A&I; from 1986-89, is Division II’s all-time leader with 6,320 yards. . . . Glendale punter Martin Boskovich is ranked seventh in the state with a 40.3-yard average. . . .

Lori Mertes, middle blocker for the Pierce women’s volleyball team, started the week ranked ranked second in the Western State Conference in kill percentage (.345), and tied for fourth in stuff blocks (35 in 15 matches). . . .

Shana Wilson, a right-side hitter from CSUN, put away a season-high 16 kills in a win over St. Mary’s last weekend. The transfer from De Anza College led CSUN with a .650 hitting percentage.

Staff writers Mike Hiserman, Theresa Munoz, John Ortega and Brendan Healey contributed to this notebook.