Gullo Is Last Link to Titans' Better Days : Football: Fifth-year linebacker is the only current player who was on Cal State Fullerton's most-recent winning team.

Gullo Is Last Link to Titans’ Better Days : Football: Fifth-year linebacker is the only current player who was on Cal State Fullerton’s most-recent winning team.

By MIKE DiGIOVANNA

Oct. 31, 1992 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

FULLERTON — Among Cal State Fullerton football players, senior linebacker Mike Gullo is the last link to the days of Titan respectability, when second-place finishes in the Big West Conference were routine and .500 records were considered a disappointment.

Gullo is the only member of the 1992 team who played during Fullerton’s most-recent winning season, a 6-4-1 mark in 1989, and was around in 1988, his redshirt year in which the Titans went 5-6 but 5-2 in conference.

It seems so long ago, doesn’t it? Since then, Fullerton has wallowed in the Land of the Lost, winning only once in 1990, twice in 1991 and twice in 1992 entering tonight’s game against Utah State.

Gullo, the only Titan who has been in the program for five years, can tell you what it’s like to tie San Diego State and defeat Pacific and San Jose State on the road.

He can also tell you what it’s like to lose 11 consecutive games in one season, give up 67 points to one opponent, earn the distinction of playing for the nation’s worst Division I-A team and be completely humiliated by a Division II team.

“He has seen it all,” Titan Coach Gene Murphy said.

And, believe it or not, Gullo wouldn’t drastically alter the view.

“I’ve been through a lot in five years, but I wouldn’t change anything,” said Gullo, who attended high school in Palatine, Ill. “I’m happy with the way things have worked out. I’m on scholarship, I should graduate next summer. . . . I guess the only change I’d make would be to win a few more games.”

When Gullo made the team as a walk-on in 1988, he looked at the talent surrounding him and figured Fullerton would play in at least one bowl game during his five years.

The Titans were solid in 1988, a little better in 1989, and Gullo, primarily a special-teams player in 1989, thought there were some good players entering the program in 1990.

“It’s hard to figure out what happened,” Gullo said of Fullerton’s 1-11 mark in 1990. “We lost a couple of games, team morale slipped, and it was all downhill after that.

“Even if we got down by a touchdown or only 10 points you could see it in the players’ eyes--we’d say, ‘Here we go again.’ We lost 11 in a row. It was a long season.”

In those days, it was difficult for Titan defenders to show their faces around campus. Fullerton allowed an average of 40.4 points per game in 1990, and the defense wasn’t much better in 1991, giving up an average of 34.2 points per game.

But this season, defense has been about the only bright spot for the Titans. Fullerton has allowed an average of 29.6 points per game, but breakdowns by the offense and special teams have contributed more to that statistic than the defense.

Of opponents’ 27 touchdowns, three have come on fumble returns and 11 have come after touchdown “drives” of 36 yards or less. The Titans rank second in the Big West in total defense (354.4 yards per game), third in rushing defense (140.3), third in passing defense (108.9) and fourth in scoring defense.

And in the middle of it all has been Gullo, a 6-foot-1, 230-pound linebacker who leads the Titans in tackles with 50 (31 solo, 19 assisted), tackles for loss (five for minus-38 yards) and is tied for the team lead with three sacks for a loss of 21 yards.

Gullo, who was put on scholarship in 1989, had 13 tackles and preserved Fullerton’s 14-10 victory over Southwestern Louisiana on Oct. 17 with an interception at the Titan 37-yard line with six seconds left. For that, he was named Big West defensive co-player of the week.

“He went from walk-on to player of the week,” Murphy said. “He weighed 190 when he got here but has worked hard and gotten a lot bigger. He’s the ultimate overachiever--he’s done some great things for us.”

Titan Notes

Fullerton Coach Gene Murphy, who will be on the sideline for his last home game as Titan coach tonight, said Utah State is a lot like Nevada, “only bigger, faster, stronger and better. This is the best Utah State team I’ve seen in a long time.” Fullerton lost to Nevada, 19-0, Oct. 3. . . . The Aggies are led defensively by lineman Joe Jacobs and linebacker Jermaine Younger. . . . Two former Saddleback College standouts, Toney Jenkins (flanker) and Michael Coe (strong safety) are expected to start for Utah State. Jenkins leads the team in receptions with 29 for 377 yards. . . . The Aggies missed connections on passes for two-point conversions twice in the fourth quarter last Saturday and lost to San Jose State, 27-25.