COLLEGE BASKETBALL PREVIEW CAL STATE NORTHRIDGE WOMEN : Good Recruiting Class Spawns Optimism

What do you say to a potential basketball recruit when your team was 2-24 the season before?

Don’t worry about splinters, you’ll play.

Hey, at least the gym isn’t too loud .

We have home and away uniforms--one for each win .

If you are Cal State Northridge women’s basketball Coach Kim Chandler, you offer recruits a Division I college basketball scholarship. You dangle an opportunity to help revamp the Matador program and the chance to establish a bit of tradition at Northridge. Hint: You don’t dwell on the 24 losses.

Chandler’s sales pitch must have struck a chord. The Matadors, who have five returning players, landed nine new players, including The Times’ 1992 Westside player of the year, 5-foot-11 freshman forward Alana Collins of University High.

Three freshman guards earned All-State honors as high school seniors--Michelle Esparza in Division I-AA, Carrie Dormire in Division III and Shannon Crouse in Division IV. Esparza also led the Southern Section in scoring the past two seasons.

“We’re building the foundation,” Chandler said. “We’re not going to go 27-0 these first couple of years, but that’s what we’re working for.”

Chandler, 27, was promoted from assistant last January after Janet Martin was forced to resign. The team was 0-9 when Chandler took over, and she guided Northridge to a 2-15 record the rest of the way.

Chandler is cautiously optimistic about this season, only Northridge’s third in Division I. The losing will not abate immediately, she knows, maybe not even this season. But Chandler likes her group of players, saying they are more talented and play more cohesively than the 1991-92 squad.

“Last year was a tough year,” Chandler said. “This year, we’re putting all that behind us. Everything is moving right along. It’s been very positive.”

Chiefly, the large list of incoming players best illustrates Chandler’s hope that the program is on the upswing. Eight freshmen are on the team, including Collins, a three-time All-City selection who averaged 23.2 points and 14.5 rebounds as a high school senior.

“It’s going to take Alana some time to get used to the physicality of the game,” Chandler said. “But she’s very talented and very coachable.”

Newcomers Mary Jean Espino and Kris Waldorf will compete for the starting point guard position.

Espino, a 5-5 junior who earned All-State honors last season at San Jose City College, could have the edge over Waldorf, a 5-5 freshman from Gahr High.

“(Espino) is very quick and has a complete package offensively,” Chandler said. “We may give Kris the opportunity to watch what’s happening and then go play, and not throw her to the wolves.”

Seniors Sandi Olson, Jodi Bittner and Haily Griffith will start in the front court, and Janine Caldwell, a senior walk-on from New Mexico Junior College, will start at off-guard.

“Hopefully, the program will breed excitement because the players are young and I am young,” Chandler said. “Everything is new. There’s nowhere to go but up.”