Coach Cameron Dollar is excited to start journey at Seattle U.

No one really knows for sure where this journey — Seattle University re-entering Division I basketball — will lead.

Or how long it will take to get to any of the desired destinations — conference affiliation, postseason play, the attention that comes with big-time success.

What coach Cameron Dollar does know is that he's eager to sit again in the driver's seat and navigate.

Dollar, 33, was an assistant at Washington the past seven years, and he could have stayed with the Huskies, safe in the security of a team that seems set to contend for quite a while.

Instead, for his first D-I head-coaching job, he has ventured into the unknown of a program that won't be eligible for the NCAA tournament until 2013 and has no guarantee of getting into any conference anytime soon.

Dollar, though, has an answer for those who might wonder if he knows what he's gotten himself into. At age 22, he spent a season as the head coach at Southern California College (now Vanguard University), an NAIA school in Costa Mesa, Calif. He was the youngest head college basketball coach in America, and just a year removed from a playing career at UCLA that featured a national title and had concluded with a trip to the Elite Eight.

"I was driving the van," Dollar said of one of the less glamorous duties of that job. "So I have literally seen every stage [of college basketball]. And there were parts of it I honestly miss today. There's a pureness to it. Kids are kids and basketball is basketball and the stage is the stage. Even as you are building to get to [elite status] it's fun to enjoy the process along the way and it's fun to be part of something that as you go through the years, you can have great pride in it. It's fun to be a part of kind of taking it up."

It's a grind Dollar — who was named coach last April after Joe Callero left for Cal Poly-San Luis Obispo — has been preparing for since about the time he could first walk and talk. He grew up in a basketball family, the son of noted Atlanta-area high school coach Don Dollar (now an assistant for Cameron at Seattle U).

Coaching was really all he ever wanted to do, something he rediscovered following his UCLA playing days. He had become friends with Magic Johnson, who used to train regularly at Pauley Pavilion. And initially unknown to Dollar, Johnson arranged a personal trainer and an agent for Dollar following his UCLA playing days. Dollar had invites to several NBA camps and seemed guaranteed at least playing overseas if he wanted.

But then came a call from Pat Douglass, the coach at UC-Irvine, who had heard that Dollar had interest in coaching and wondered if he'd like to interview for a job as an assistant.

"I said, 'Man, coach, I don't know if I'm supposed to do it this early,' " Dollar said. But the interview sealed in his mind that coaching was what he was meant to do. He thanked Magic for all the help but said he had to follow his dream of coaching.

"Best decision I ever made in my life," he said.

The head coaching job at Southern California College came a year later, then he landed a part-time assistant's job at Georgia in 1999. A few months later, Lorenzo Romar — who had been an assistant coach during Dollar's early playing days at UCLA — called and offered a full-time job at Saint Louis.

Three years there led to seven more at Washington.

There was an early misstep at UW — recruiting violations during his first months at UW largely involving Clarkston big man Josh Heytvelt. But mostly, there was success, which led to Dollar becoming one of the hotter young names in coaching. An ESPN The Magazine article last spring highlighted him as one of five top assistants in the country.

And if the violations might have made it a little harder to get a head coaching job, Dollar was happy to remain a UW assistant. He had an uncommon amount of responsibility at Washington and was growing comfortable in his role.

"He got a lot of freedom within our program to be almost like a head coach as an assistant," Romar said. "He ran our entire defense — there are a lot of the things that he did that I just let him run with it. Recruiting. Lots of suggestions that he made that I said, 'OK, go ahead and do it.' So that allowed him to sit back and wait a little while longer for the right situation."

Dollar admits he never really had Seattle U. on any list until he heard of Callero leaving last spring.

"I had never been here, ever," he says after a recent Seattle U. practice. "It's funny how things like this happen because you don't think about the one that's right under your nose."

Intrigued after Callero left, however, he pursued the job with Seattle U. athletic director Bill Hogan.

An interview at the Final Four in Detroit, Hogan says, was key. "That's where it really started to all come together," Hogan says. "It seemed like we were going in the same direction."

Seattle U., as a private school, won't release details of Dollar's contract other than to say it's a long-term agreement for both.

And Dollar insists he doesn't see Seattle U. as a steppingstone, that he was drawn to the job because he thinks he can accomplish just about whatever he wants right here. He cites the school's urban setting and ability to attract big-time recruits, and its history of success in the 1950s, '60s and '70s, as signs that there's no limit to Seattle U.'s potential.

"One of the things that make this really, really special is that there is no ceiling," Dollar said. "Being in Seattle, one of only two D-I schools in this area and the talent of the kids in this area, playing at KeyArena [where Seattle U will play all of its home games] — you have the potential to develop and grow outside the box."

While Seattle U. can't go to the NCAA tournament for three years, it could be invited to any other postseason tournament, and Dollar talks of the NIT as a goal. He has three starters returning from a team that went 21-8 last year (13-8 against D-I teams) and added some potential impact recruits, notably 6-foot-9 power forward Charles Garcia, who initially signed with Washington.

And while conventional wisdom would indicate it would be easier being in a conference, Dollar says there could be advantages to being an Independent. For now, there is no significant movement on getting in a conference, with the WCC, WAC, Big West and Big Sky among the more logical targets.

"Our deal is this — you've got to make yourself attractive to where you now have options to pick where you want to go if you want to go somewhere," Dollar said.

Dollar worried most that being an Independent would make scheduling difficult, but he says he's been pleasantly surprised that it hasn't, that being the only Independent on the West Coast has made Seattle U. an attractive opponent. He said he even found himself with too many home games for February 2011, a month he was most concerned about since that's when teams typically concentrate on league games.

This year, Seattle U. will host Fresno State in its marquee home game, and play at Oklahoma State. Next year, Seattle U. will host Washington and Oregon State, and will play Maryland in the Coaches vs. Cancer tournament. It also has a home-and-home set with Virginia and former WSU coach Tony Bennett (Virginia will come to Seattle during the 2011-12 season).

Dollar says he wants to see his team play before making any real judgments about how quickly his program can reach any of its goals.

Romar, though, professes no doubts.

"With Cameron, I can say it could happen a lot quicker than people might think," Romar said. "If it happens sooner rather than later, it wouldn't surprise me at all."

Bob Condotta: 206-515-5699 or bcondotta@seattletimes.com.