THINGS WON'T CHANGE IN NORTHRIDGE.

Byline: STEVE DILBECK

Nothing is going to change.

That's the fear. That's the lowered expectations that sadly have become ingrained at Cal State Northridge.

CSUN reeks with potential yet remains mired as a second-rate NCAA Division I program with second-rate facilities.

The surprising news Thursday that athletic director Dick Dull is stepping down to become the department's fundraiser could prove a bellwether for CSUN's athletic future.

Only there is no real reason to believe it will happen.

Not as long as Jolene Koester remains the school president. Not as long as another blue-ribbon commission is formed to create another five-year plan. Not as long as administrators reach for Band-Aids when facilities cry out for major surgery.

CSUN's next A.D. needs to be bright, young, energetic. Someone not afraid to be told no, and when they are, ready to go back and try again. Someone to champion the department, someone with actual vision.

Someone who currently might be an associate athletic director at a school with existing athletic excellence and looking to head his or her own program.

Really think Koester will look for that person?

Koester came to CSUN from Sacramento State. She's given the interim athletic director's position to Janet Lucas, who has been at CSUN for one year after 15 at James Madison.

This is not exactly coming from Big Ten or Southeastern conference schools, from places with historic athletic heritage in which sports are valued for what they can bring to the university and community.

More of the same, that's what we've come to expect. More nice people who are fine administrators. More looking at CSUN athletics is a necessity, not as something unique that could offer an incredible boom to a sleepy commuter campus.

Lowered expectations have become almost institutionalized at CSUN. Athletic dreams fade there.

If it's ever going to change, it has to begin at the top. And Koester has shown only tepid interest in athletics.

CSUN needs a president committed to the athletic department. At USC, it is known Steve Sample cares about sports. At UCLA, there's no question Albert Carnesale is passionate about athletics.

They're at games, in the locker rooms, attending news conferences. They champion their programs.

Koester attends plenty of games, but she's like the grandmother who watches little Johnny play and then goes home. Wasn't that nice?

She's not driving him to practice every day, taking him to camps, buying him equipment, encouraging him after disappointments.

If Koester has a competitive side, it's concealed. She is liked and respected as the CSUN president, but sports are clearly not a priority.

She wants to build a $100 million performing-arts center that will seat 1,600. The performing arts, now that's a priority.

A new arena that could serve home to a men's basketball team that is supposed to be the flagship of the athletic program, that could be shared with the women's basketball team, the volleyball teams, that could be used for concerts and the circus and graduations and high school All-Star games, that is badly needed by the entire Valley and would cost significantly less than $100 million ... already ruled out.

It's difficult for the athletic director to wage these wars when he/she recognizes a complete lack of administrative support.

Unfairly, Dull's legacy as an athletic director always will be as the man who killed football at CSUN and was forced out at Maryland after basketball star Lenny Bias died of a cocaine overdose after he was selected second overall by the Boston Celtics in 1986.

It must be remembered that when Dull came to CSUN six years ago, the program was in virtual chaos. There were sex, drug and racism scandals.

It wasn't an athletic department, it was Motley Crue on tour.

Dull calmed the waters. He brought badly needed stability to the department.

And he is competitive, does care about his teams, does try to meet their needs.

Yet Dull and CSUN always seemed an odd fit. He was an East Coast guy and perhaps tellingly, never has bought a home here. He applied for several other A.D. jobs while at CSUN.

When Koester arrived a year after he did, Dull seemed to survey the landscape and decide which battles could be won and which were best to avoid.

Although always quick to point out he recommended the football program be dropped, it was Koester who made the call. When he saw no Koester support for an arena but for a performing-arts center, he was completely on board.

He became the good soldier, the purveyor of status quo. He did what he could for his under-budgeted program, but he did not try to do anything more.

It is a curious move, going from athletic director to department fundraiser. Certainly, it is an encouraging sign that the department now has such a badly needed position although odd that it is Dull, who never displayed skill for fundraising as the A.D.

Dull is charged with raising $10 million to improve athletic facilities, with $6 million going toward adding 1,400 seats to the antiquated school gym.

There are two problems here.

First, if you really want to rebuild the gym, show some commitment and put some money up front. Demonstrate to the community you're behind it before you attempt to rally its support.

And second, if you're going to raise $6 million, why not shoot for $16 million and build a new gym? Why use a Band-Aid approach when so much more is genuinely needed?

The only answer can be that Koester truly does not get it. She understands neither the campus-wide benefit from a multiuse arena nor how special sports can be to a university.

It can unify a campus. Excite the students, bring pride to the university. Make a national name for a school.

That was the CSUN men's basketball team playing Kansas on national television in 2001, not the drama department.

As with most change, there is great opportunity here, just no reason to believe it will be fulfilled.

Koester wants another committee to come up with another five-year department plan - the five-year plan Dull put together for her apparently is no longer in service.

After the plan is completed in December, then a national search supposedly will begin for Dull's replacement, which is utterly backward.

Why not let the new A.D. have impact in this five-year plan?

The dread is clearly because Koester wants his role clearly defined, wants another good soldier.

With Dull's exit, the athletic department has had a complete turnover in the past year. Despite saving $1 million by dropping football, budgets of programs have been slashed. Morale among frustrated coaches is awful.

This entire five-year plan, national-search bit sounds like so much cover for simply handing the position to Lucas.

You don't want to prejudge Lucas, but she clearly would be indebted to Koester, in step with her benefactor.

It doesn't sound like someone eager to rattle cages, to impart needed vision to CSUN, to raise the program up and wake the Valley's sleeping giant.

So much opportunity, so much more fear that nothing will change.

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Photo:

Cal State Northridge played Kansas in the 2001 NCAA men's basketball tournament.

Tom Pidgeon/Allsport/Getty Images