ORONO – Having already run the NCAA-infractions gauntlet with the University of Maryland, Suzanne J. Tyler has thrown herself into the running for the University of Maine’s athletic directors chair.

Maryland’s senior associate athletic director came to town in the state university’s ongoing AD sweepstakes Friday and spoke openly about Maryland’s recent tangle with an NCAA investigation into the Terrapins’ football program.

“That was something that was generated by the athletic department. We dealt with that openly,” she said of the suspensions for gambling suffered by five Terp athletes, including senior quarterback Scott Milanovich.

Milanovich, the school’s most prolific passer, was initially handed an eight-game suspension this summer by the NCAA for betting a total of $200 on six different college football games during the 1992, ’93, and ’94 seasons.

After an appeal, Milanovich’s suspension was reduced to four games.

Three other football players were suspended for one game and a reserve basketball player received a 20-game suspension, which is still under appeal.

“We put it right out there, took our licks, didn’t like them and appealed them, and were able to get a reduction of the original set of penalties,” Tyler said during a press conference at the Palmer Lounge.

“I wasn’t pleased with the total outcome because I still think it was too harsh an outcome for all of the different things and the handling of the case, but it’s over and we’re moving on,” she said.

Tyler, who designed Maryland’s compliance program in 1991 after Maryland’s Len Bias-era, was reported to be the first woman to be interviewed for the Maine athletic director’s job. Her interview came on the heels of Donald Kaverman’s appearance for the same job earlier this week.

Kaverman, formerly the associate athletic director for business and financial affairs at San Diego State University, was the first to be interviewed in UM’s second search for an athletic director to replace Michael Ploszek.

More candidates are expected to be interviewed for the job.

Tyler, who earned her Ph.D. in physical education from Maryland in 1986, said she was concerned with the NCAA’s investigation at Maine but not deterred from taking the position.

“It certainly is a concern. It’s something that looms ahead for the department, but it’s been handled in a very professional and positive manner,” Tyler said. “You take something like this and you learn as much as you can so it won’t happen again.

“You deal with the people and the press openly. You say this happened, this is what happened, this is why it happened, and this is what the NCAA said,” she explained.

“We’re going to put in pro-active measures and stop gap measures, and they’ve (UM) done that. They’ve hired people, they’ve put measures in place, they’ve computerized.”

Tyler characterized the athletic director’s job as a three-part proposition: creating friends and fans outside the university; pulling together support on campus from students, administrators and faculty; and managing the athletic department.

The mother of a 4-year-old son and 3-year-old daughter, Tyler earned a master’s degree at Penn State after receiving a physical education degree from Northeastern University in 1969.

She was Maryland’s acting athletic director for three months in 1990 after climbing the administrative ladder from her 1981 hiring as Maryland’s field hockey and women’s lacrosse coach.