Cal State L.A. Coach Resigns : Cross-country: Investigation into women’s allegations against Ryan continues.

Cal State Los Angeles women’s cross-country Coach Greg Ryan, who is being investigated for improprieties in his program, has resigned, the school announced Friday.

Officials at Cal State L.A. released a statement saying that Ryan, who is also the women’s track coach, resigned Thursday. The statement also said that the university would continue looking into complaints filed by three former members of the women’s cross-country team.

In May, Ryan was accused by Maria Lopez, Gracie Padilla and Jeri Young of mentally abusing athletes, misappropriating funds and violating numerous NCAA rules.

“I think this was for the best,” Young said after learning of Ryan’s resignation. “These things need to be taken more seriously.”

The school began investigating the allegations in June and in Friday’s statement said their findings would be released in September.

Neither Ryan nor Athletic Director Carol Dunn returned calls.

Since the investigation began, new allegations have surfaced against Ryan and other athletic department officials.

Last week, The Times reported that Lopez and Padilla told school investigators that Ryan arranged for team members to receive grades for classes they never attended. Records also showed that another former Golden Eagle runner might have violated NCAA rules by competing while academically ineligible.

In the complaints filed in May and obtained by The Times, Ryan was accused of offering full athletic scholarships and then reneging when the athletes arrived on campus; paying the rent for a star athlete while she hadn’t yet enrolled at Cal State L.A.; signing a parent’s name to financial aid documents and telling some athletes to sign for per-diem payments to events in which they did not participate; loaning athletes money and having an obsession with athletes’ weight that resulted in eating habits that encouraged them to skip meals.

Ryan, a coach at Cal State L.A. for eight years, was Division II women’s cross-country coach of the year last year in the Western Region.