Tony Camp, Millennium Hall of Fame

Every member of those Estancia High basketball teams seemed tall,

lean and mean during pregame layups, then they blew the doors off

opponents.

As a freshmen team under coach and school vice principal Bill Wetzel

in 1976-77, the Eagles lost only once and scared every other freshman in

the Century League out of the gym.

Tony Camp and a few other notables graduated straight to the varsity

the next season at the beginning of the Larry Sunderman regime and

dominated basketball for three years, going 60-19 (.760 winning percentage) with a pair of Sea View League championships.

Camp, Steve Van Horn and Tim Krohnfeldt formed the nucleus in hoops,

while the 6-foot-4, 220-pound Camp, a prototype tight end in football who

went on to establish receiving records at the University of the Pacific,

helped Estancia tower above the league on the fall-of-’79 gridiron.

One of the school’s most accomplished football-basketball stars, Camp

earned 1980 Male Athlete of the Year honors over two pretty tough

competitors that year -- Rich Amaral and Bob Larimer -- both top football

and baseball players.

“Just growing up there in Costa Mesa and playing sports, instead of

video games, was a great childhood,” Camp said by telephone from Redwood

City.

“I think (life) is a lot tougher on kids nowadays ... I don’t see kids

in the fields playing basketball and football. They’re playing soccer

sometimes, but not touch football. That was a good way for us to spend

time growing up, and Costa Mesa was a great place to grow up at that

time, then we played sports in high school and had great coaches.”

Camp, whose older brother, Mike, was an All-Orange County footballer

in ‘77, could shoot from the wing or bang in the post with anyone as he

teamed with the late Van Horn, et al, to win back-to-back league

basketball championships.

“Steve was the best player,” Camp said. “Unfortunately he died so

early. I remember playing against him in elementary school and how he had

the sharpest elbows. It was nice being on the same team (in high school).

“We obviously had some good talent (from the Class of ‘80), but the

coaching from Wetzel was fantastic. He was an incredible influence on me,

just in the tenacity we had in practice and how he instilled that in his

program ... basketball at Estancia was really exceptional, and it was a

great foundation to learn from.”

In football, Camp and all-league offensive linemen Jeff Tracy and Alan

Akana led Estancia’s power sweeps from the strong side, enabling tailback

Robert Urmson to eclipse the 1,000-yard mark as Coach Ed Blanton’s Eagles

(9-3) won the school’s first outright league championship and reached the

CIF Southern Section Central Conference quarterfinals.

Camp, an excellent blocker at tight end, caught 30 passes for 450

yards his senior year and played defensive end on the other side of the

ball, earning first-team all-league, first-team All-Orange Coast area and

second-team All-Orange County by the Daily Pilot.

As a junior, Camp was a first-team all-league defensive end and

third-team All-Orange Coast area choice. On offense, he caught 19 passes

for 280 yards, but Estancia struggled as a team (2-7).

Camp also threw the weights in track and field, reaching 52 feet six

inches in the shot put to win the Sea View League title and secure school

Athlete of the Year honors in one of Estancia’s best years.

At UOP, Camp caught 125 passes in his collegiate career, setting a

school record before the Tigers dropped their football program.

Camp, who added 20 pounds in college, played at UOP from 1980 to ‘82,

then in ’84 after redshirting one season because of a pulled hamstring.

Camp was twice an All-Big West Conference tight end and one year even

played basketball for the Tigers.

“My biggest highlight was winning the (Sea View) league championship

in football my senior year, because we weren’t expected to do it,” Camp

said. “It was a real close-knit group and it was great being with all

those guys.”

Camp majored in business administration and marketing at UOP, then had

a brief tryout with the 49ers, realizing he’d reached his football peak

once NFL Hall of Fame safety Ronnie Lott covered him.

“I realized I was just too slow to spread the defense (in the NFL),”

he said. “I actually walked out of camp. I knew it wasn’t a possibility

and I had a good education from UOP.”

Camp, a member of the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of Fame, celebrating the

millennium, married a cheerleader from rival Costa Mesa High, Rita

O’Loughlin. They have a daughter, Keely, 2.

Today, Camp works at Fuji Photo Film USA in the Bay area as a national

account manager.