Northridge Finally Brings In Someone Equal to the Task

Competence. It once was in short supply at Cal State Northridge, but times are changing.

The hiring of Richard Dull to become Northridge’s new athletic director is a major step toward legitimizing the school’s NCAA Division I sports ambitions.

A former athletic director at Maryland, the 53-year-old Dull possesses the necessary experience and background to help Northridge move closer to fulfilling the aspirations established when the school moved to Division I in 1990.

“I need to get involved and roll up my sleeves and play a major role in doing things, not just directing things,” he said Wednesday in a conference call announcing his selection.

This has been a decade of missed opportunities for Northridge--too many controversies, too many ill-advised hires and too many broken promises.

It’s a minor miracle that Northridge teams survived and even prospered during an era in which fund-raising was largely nonexistent and dedicated coaches found themselves rolling their eyes with every misstep.

Somehow, someway, the coaches kept plugging away, waiting for the day order would be restored.

No one is about to suggest that once Dull arrives on July 1, he’ll wave a magic wand and all of Northridge’s problems will disappear.

But at least the school has a chance to start from scratch with an intelligent, battle-tested administrator capable of pointing people in the right direction.

“We all walked out thinking, ‘How are we going to find anybody better than this?’ ” said baseball Coach Mike Batesole, who was a member of the search committee entrusted with finding a new athletic director.

Dull is getting a second chance of sorts. He was hired as Maryland’s athletic director in 1981 at the youthful age of 35, then resigned in 1986 in the wake of the death of basketball star Len Bias from a cocaine overdose.

Dull said he erred in advocating the admittance of athletes who were not academically ready for college. He has tried to rectify his mistake during stints as athletic director at Division III Moravian (Pa.) College and Division II Nebraska Kearney.

“Obviously, brokering and advocating admission of student-athletes that are not proper candidates to do successfully in the classroom is not something that I’m going to do,” he said.

There are many challenges ahead for Dull.

He must find a way to raise millions of dollars to fund the building of a football stadium while dealing with neighbors still determined to block any on-campus stadium.

He must improve athletic facilities, meet gender-equity requirements, raise money to support a broad-based athletic program and sell the community on the importance of Northridge athletics.

“I don’t want to be a caretaker and certainly I’m coming into a situation where a caretaker is not being called for,” he said.

Many still haven’t forgotten that bleak, awful June day two years ago when the school announced it was cutting baseball, volleyball, soccer and men’s swimming.

An enraged community rose up and convinced school President Blenda Wilson a horrific mistake had been made.

Now, as Wilson prepares to leave for her new job in Massachusetts heading an education foundation, her final Northridge hire will be Dull.

It is a wise choice, one that offers hope for the future.

*

Eric Sondheimer is The Times’ local columnist. He can be reached at (818) 772-3422.