CAL STATE FULLERTON NOTEBOOK / LON EUBANKS : Elders Building a Solid Foundation for Titan Track Program

Cal State Fullerton track Coach John Elders is referring to members of this year’s team as “the pioneers.” He regards them as the building blocks to an even stronger program in the future.

“I’m really thrilled that we’ve been doing a lot better,” Elders said. “I hope that we can look back on this year’s team as being the one that got us going to a higher level.”

Elders is still smiling over the Titans’ first-place finish last weekend in a four-team meet that included the three other Big West Conference teams: UC Santa Barbara, Long Beach State and UC Irvine. It marked the first time Fullerton has won a team event since track was reinstated in 1989.

This is Fullerton’s second try at producing a competitive Division I track program. The first attempt in the early 1980s fared badly. The Titans wound up last in the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. meet three years in a row, from 1981-83, and scored a total of only one point in the three meets. And, zap, the men’s program was gone.

The school had done well in Division II track in the 1970s but quickly found that the world was different in Division I.

For five years then, track at Fullerton became a sport only for women. Elders was a runner at the school in 1985 and he remembers how discouraging it was to members of the men’s cross-country team when they had nothing to do in the spring except train.

Elders’ goal for his team this year is to be the “king of the have-nots,” the term he uses for the schools in the Big West whose track budgets fall well below those of the league’s front-runners.

“Nevada and Utah State have budgets well beyond ours,” Elders said. “We know we don’t have a powerhouse program at this stage, but we hope we can finish at least third in the conference this season. That’s why we were so pleased with winning the meet last weekend.”

The big difference between Nevada and Utah State and the other schools in the conference, according to Elders, is money. He said both schools have the full NCAA allotment of men’s scholarship money, the equivalent of 12 full scholarships.

“We have roughly $6,000 in scholarship money for both men’s track and cross-country,” Elders said. “And that’s not all money coming from the state. A lot is what I fund-raise myself.”

Elders is optimistic that funding for the track and cross-country programs will increase.

“I think the current administration is sensitive to looking at the individual sports and seeing what the needs are,” Elders said. “We don’t even have team sweat suits and we’ve had to help raise money for some of the team travel in the past. . . . We need a $4,000 to $5,000 equipment budget for each of our teams.

“I’m like the coach of any sport. I think ours is the most important, but I understand the priority system. I just want to be able to get what I think we need.”

Elders acknowledges that being located in Southern California’s favorable climate zone has significant value.

“The location is definitely helpful to us in being able to field a competitive team,” Elders said. “But, obviously, the more resources, the better we’ll be.”

The school’s new track complex also should help recruiting, Elders says. “It makes it easier for a local kid to consider going to Fullerton,” he said. “Before, we may not have been an option for them without our own track.”

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Last weekend at UC Irvine, highly regarded Titan runner Heather Killeen competed in her first meet since she was injured in cross-country, but she’s still not back to full strength.

“She was sixth in the 3,000 meters, but she ran very conservatively, just to get back into it,” Elders said. “She’s been back doing training for two months and light track workouts for about a month.”

Her time was 10 minutes 33.1 seconds, well off the 9:59.7 winning pace set by Laura Monson of UC Irvine.

“But she’s just happy to be back running again,” said her mother, Sharon, “and she knows she’s trying to condense a lot of training into a relatively short period of time.”

Killeen originally suffered an injured left hip, and then because of compensating for it, a problem developed in her right knee in October. That caused her to miss the Big West cross-country meet.

The Titans’ other top female distance runner, Tania Nahale, also is recovering from an injury. “She’s missed two weeks because of a knee problem,” Elders said. “She’s been fitted for some orthopedic in-soles and we’re hoping that will help.”

Killeen and Nahale run the distance events from 3,000 to 10,000 meters.

“I’m hoping now that they’ll both be ready for the Big West meet,” Elders said. The conference meet will be May 13-14 at Las Cruces, N.M.

One of the team’s other top performers, sprinter Casie Lozano, had the best effort of her career in the 200 meters in the weekend meet, with a time of 25.48.

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The Fullerton baseball team held its No. 1 spot in the Collegiate Baseball rankings but fell back to third on the Baseball America list, which has Fullerton ranked behind Florida State and USC. The Titans won two of three games against Big West rival UC Santa Barbara over the weekend.

The Titans (26-6) are preparing for another three-game conference series Friday night through Sunday afternoon at Long Beach State.

Pitching continues to be a strength. The staff earned-run average is 2.62 with starters Mike Parisi (1.44) and Matt Wagner (1.46) leading the way.

Jeff Ferguson has the top batting average (.347) among the regulars.

Outfielder Dante Powell, a preseason All-American choice, is behind the pace of his last two seasons. He’s hitting .279 after reaching .335 in 1993 and .307 in 1992. Powell, however, is tied for the team lead in runs batted in with Ferguson at 27.

Titan Notes

The women’s gymnastics team will compete in the NCAA West Regional Saturday at Boise, Idaho. The Titans’ Celeste Delia is tied for 20th nationally in the all-around. . . . The Titan basketball honors banquet will be held at 7 p.m. April 28 at the Fullerton Marriott.