George Allen’s ‘Impossible’ Job : College football: Veteran Rams and Redskins coach comes out of retirement at age 72 to tackle ‘toughest Division I job in the country.’

LONG BEACH — The clock struck noon on what was already another long day for George Allen. With Cal State Long Beach’s opener against Clemson fast approaching, the 72-year-old coach with a reputation for turning water into wine feared a tidal wave lest he miraculously locate another defensive lineman or two.

“I’ve been on the phone all night just trying to find another football player,” Allen said. “I hate to see a program struggling like this to find players. We don’t even have enough defensive linemen for a scrimmage. I’ve always had good defenses. Great defenses. So this is kind of a shock to me.”

Days like this were inevitable when Allen decided last December to tackle the toughest assignment of his coaching career. Cal State Long Beach was fourth-and-inches away from dropping its football program four years ago. The 49ers were 4-8 last season. They lost 52-0 to Big West Conference champion Cal State Fresno. Their final home game, a 31-18 win over Utah State, attracted just 1,575 spectators to antiquated Veterans Memorial Stadium.

But Allen, whose dozen seasons with the Rams and Washington Redskins all resulted in winning records, instead saw one glorious chance to confirm his greatness. He pulled his old playbooks and slogans out of mothballs to take what he called at the time of his hiring one of the four or five toughest Division I jobs in the country.

He has since changed his mind.

“It’s the toughest Division I job in the country,” Allen said. “We almost dropped football. We don’t have the support of the students or community. Facilities are lacking. We don’t have our own stadium. We don’t have any depth in players.”

So why did Allen risk the remainder of his sanity on what even St. Jude might dismiss as just another hopeless cause?

“Because everyone said it was an impossibility,” Allen said. “When about five people told me it was impossible, that’s when I got interested.

Allen last coached a professional football game in 1984, guiding the Arizona Wranglers to the United States Football League playoffs. He last coached a college football game in 1956, leading the Whittier Poets to a 4-3-3 record. He last experienced a losing season of any kind in 1954.

The Future Is Now, proclaims a grinning Allen with his thumbs up on the cover of this year’s Cal State Long Beach media guide. But he knows better. He watches practice every day.

“There’s no question in my mind that this program will be turned around,” he said. “But we won’t do it overnight. There’s too much that needs to be done. There are a million and one things to do.”

Saturday’s opener at 10th-ranked Clemson appears to have all the competitive balance of Little Big Horn.

“I’ve never played a game I didn’t think we could win,” Allen said. He paused, then smiled weakly. “However, I’ve never played a game where we were 58-point underdogs.”

Long Beach has two quality receivers in Sean Foster and Mark Seay, but both lines are shaky, and the starting quarterback, Todd Studer, has never played major college football. Allen is fanatical about the importance of special teams, but he has yet to parlay that passion into discernible results.

“I had one kick blocked in seven years at Washington, and we had two blocked in two minutes during our last scrimmage,” Allen moaned.

But the 108 players are receptive to Allen’s enthusiasm, even if the coach rings few bells when he calls up names from his colorful past.

“The other day I was talking to my players and said that guy reminds me of Billy Kilmer,” Allen said. “They said, ‘Who’s Billy Kilmer?’ ”

At 72, Allen is the oldest coach in college football. But he has plunged into his new job with the enthusiasm of a young assistant trying to make a name, routinely working 14-hour days.

“He’s 72 going on 27,” said former Raider Willie Brown, Long Beach’s new secondary coach. “He’ll work until 11 or 12 at night, and then he’ll be completely fresh when he gets here the next morning. He’s on a mission.”