Whither Long Beach After Allen : Football: He rallied alumni, friends around struggling program. His death brings questions about its future.

In the wake of George Allen’s death, Cal State Long Beach officials say they will remain strongly committed to football, though longtime supporters of the program fear it could slip back into anonymity.

“What do we do, see if Tom Landry’s interested?” said former Long Beach and NFL player Jeff Severson, referring half-jokingly to the former coach of the Dallas Cowboys.

University President Curtis L. McCray said he will meet with Athletic Director Corey Johnson next week to consider a successor to Allen, who died Monday at 72.

Allen kept repeating, “The future is now,” throughout his brief Long Beach tenure, but it is hard to tell where the future lies for 49er football.

“We want to keep the winning tradition that the coach had begun to establish,” McCray said. “Yes, it’s a tough road. We saw that even with Coach Allen it was difficult to get a good crowd.”

Severson and other Long Beach boosters became enamored of Allen for giving them a reason to have some pride in the program.

“Where can we find a guy with the magnetism and networking he had?” Severson asked. “We need a guy with George’s enthusiasm and guts to battle the red tape of the state college system and overcome it. It will have to be a dynamic person who’s not afraid of the problems.”

Allen, sometimes working 18-hour days, overcame a myriad of problems and worries to lead the 49ers to a 6-5 record, their first winning season in four years. Wearing his cap with LB stitched on it, he kept popping up nationally in magazine and television profiles, bringing the school more publicity than it dreamed possible.

Before Allen’s surprising arrival a little more than a year ago, football was languishing at Long Beach, which had two winning seasons in seven years. The sport was nearly dropped four years ago because of financial troubles.

Allen made progress in rebuilding the program. He raised money, improved facilities, got new uniforms and gave the players so much confidence and inspiration that some said they felt like pros.

Allen’s mystique was largely responsible for home attendance increasing about 2,000 a game, but the average was only 4,679. Revenue from ticket sales fell $50,000 below what was projected, according to Dan Radakovich, athletic department business manager.

Ken Visser, recently named coach at Whittier College after 12 years as a 49er assistant, is uncertain about what Long Beach will do in regard to hiring a new coach.

“They needed someone with notoriety to get it (the football program) back on its feet,” Visser said, “and they may try to get somebody like that again, although that would be hard to do. Or they might go within the staff or open it up.

“It won’t be the same as when Coach Allen was there,” he said. “But I think there will be some residual effects. People will wonder now how Long Beach is doing because that’s where George Allen coached. It will be on people’s minds a little more. And they’ve got a strong team returning.”

Among the players who will be back next season are quarterback Todd Studer and receivers Mark Seay and Jeff Exum, all of whom had good seasons under Allen.