Wrestling Wizards : El Camino Pair Lead the Way to State Championships

There are two big reasons why El Camino’s wrestling team is headed to Fresno for the junior college state championship tournament this weekend.

Well, one, Robert Avila, is big (5-foot-10, 260 pounds). The other, Kyle Onaga, is small (5-1, 118 pounds) and stocky, but extremely powerful and quick.

You might say the beefy guy and his tough little teammate have also played crucial roles in leading the Warriors, predicted to place fifth in the South Coast Conference early in the season, to a second-place finish in the six-member league.

After losing every wrestler from a team that placed fourth in the SCC and 14th in the state, Coach Tom Hazell wasn’t optimistic at the beginning of the season, and he had good reason.

His young team got hammered in its first two dual meets against Moorpark and Bakersfield, and shortly after that his 126-pounder, freshman Kelly Yokoe (West Torrance High), quit wrestling, claiming exhaustion.

“We started off a bit slow,” said Hazell, a former El Camino and Oklahoma State wrestler. “We had all new guys, but they were real tough guys and I knew that.”

Avila’s recollection was a lot more graphic: “At first I thought, ‘Yeah, we got a tough team but not a real competitive one. We kind of got a raggedy team here.’ Then in our first dual meet we got the crap beat out of us. I mean we lost our first four meets pretty bad. It was the worst.”

But the Warriors came to life after that with six consecutive wins. The streak included victories over Caltech, San Bernardino, San Diego, Rio Hondo and SCC co-champion Cerritos. El Camino (4-2 in the SCC) lost only two conference tests, to Palomar (SCC co-champ) and Rancho Santiago.

Now Hazell refers to his team as perhaps the best in his 10 years as El Camino’s coach. The school has had six individual state champions in that span but never a championship team or a first-place in its tough league.

While the Warriors don’t have the personnel to win the team state title, they have the talent to place in the top 10 and add a couple of California champions to their list.

Besides Onaga and Avila, El Camino will take West Torrance freshman Craig Garriott (150 pounds) and Ben Rice (190 pounds), a freshman from Washington, to Fresno City College. Both placed third at the Southern California Regionals last week at Rancho Santiago.

West Torrance freshman Jerry Decker (158 pounds) and South Torrance freshman John Prefontaine (167 pounds) will go as alternates for placing fourth at the regionals.

Onaga finished second at Rancho Santiago after losing to top-ranked Eric Legarrta of Golden West College in the final. The 6-5 loss was Onaga’s first of the season. The 22-year-old has a 10-1 record, which includes five matches in the 126-pound division and a 13-9 victory in the 134-pound category, a great feat for such a small wrestler.

The Rolling Hills High graduate has reason to feel assurance. After redshirting in his first year at El Camino because of a dislocated right elbow, Onaga placed second in the state as a freshman All-American in 1987.

He quit competitive wrestling after that to attend Cal State Dominguez Hills, but Hazell and several team members persuaded him to join this year’s depth-lacking club after Yokoe quit.

“His height, or rather lack of it, makes it very hard to take him down,” Hazell said. “He’s real tough on his feet and he can take anybody down.”

The same applies to Avila, who’s twice as large and 142 pounds heavier. The portly freshman from Mark Keppel High in Alhambra has racked up a 22-5 mark as a heavyweight. He placed first at the regional with a 3-1 overtime victory against Palomar’s Phil Jones in the final.

“He’s extremely strong although he doesn’t really look like it,” Hazell said. “It’s very difficult to take him down.”

Onaga praises his teammate: “He’s a stud. I’m glad I can say we wrestle on the same team. He thrives on pressure and he wrestles on power, and he’s got arrogant confidence.”

That’s what brought Avila success at Mark Keppel where he was a three-time All-Mission Valley League selection. He left the school with a 140-22 career mark and broke a six-year school record with 92 pins. The 18-year-old placed second at last year’s high school state tournament, which he entered with a 52-0 mark.

The ability to attack the opponent’s lower body made Avila a unique heavyweight. Most wrestlers in his category strike above the waist because they’re not agile enough to hit the legs.

“He was good at everything,” said Mark Keppel assistant coach Larry Landless. “He can even shoot (go for the legs) like a lightweight.”