Wrecking ball won't wipe out memories of Camden's fabled gym
For Milt Wagner, it wasn't the scene in Camden High School's gymnasium that made such a lasting impression. It was the sound.
For Milt Wagner, it wasn't the scene in Camden High School's gymnasium that made such a lasting impression.
It was the sound.
"That's what I'll always remember," Wagner said the other day, reminiscing about South Jersey's most fabled home court.
The site of more big basketball games and the showcase for more great basketball players than any place in South Jersey - probably times three - Clarence Turner Gym will be torn down along with the rest of the building after this school year to make way for a new facility at the corner of Baird and Park Boulevards.
What the wrecking ball won't demolish are memories created in the iconic gym with the off-white tile walls, exposed metal rafters, and collection of plaques, banners, and posters celebrating a Who's Who of state basketball history.
The new Camden High will get a new gym - two of them, in fact - and the main one will be bright and airy with modern locker rooms and likely will have Turner's name emblazoned on the wall and Dajuan Wagner's name painted on the floor, just like the old joint.
But it won't be the same. Something's lost and something's gained in every transaction, and the construction of a state-of-the-art facility - a wonderful thing for future generations of students - means the demolition of a place steeped in sports history.
The old gym with two sets of metal double doors that open to the parking lot was part of an addition to the original building in 1969, just in time for Turner to take over and turn the Panthers into a national power.
Much of the mystique about the place, and the program, stems from the 1970s and 1980s, when Camden basketball was a near-invincible army stationed behind the imposing red-brick walls of a place known as "The Castle on the Hill."
"I remember being in eighth grade and going to watch a game there in Kevin Walls' senior year in 1984," former Camden star Vic Carstarphen said. "The place was packed, so loud, so much atmosphere.
"I'm like, 'Wow, look at this place.' "
The place was daunting to visiting teams, especially when Camden would hit the court in those days with 15 players - five in full-length white warm-ups, five in full-length purple, five in full-length gold.
"You never left South Jersey without going through that gym," said current Camden coach John Valore, who spent the first 36 seasons of his career at Cherry Hill East. "I can honestly state that they were the most enjoyable games of my career."
Cherry Hill East 1986 graduates Nick and Tom Katsikas, both of whom played Division I college basketball, remember the challenge of playing in that gym.
"It was war," Tom Katsikas said.
Eastern coach Kevin Crawford, who played for Camden Catholic against Camden in the mid 1990s, recalls the "intimidation of a city rallying around their prized jewel, the Camden High basketball team."
As do so many others, Crawford regards the challenge of playing at Camden as one of the most valuable experiences of his athletic career.
"Looking back, playing at Camden was a blast," Crawford said. "If you can handle that type of pressure environment, you can handle most things in life."
The gym was home to the 1974 Camden team that won the Group 3 state title and featured future NFL players Art Still and Derrick Ramsey along with Darryl "Doc" Lee, who was known to bang out tunes on the piano in the corner after another victory.
The 1978 and 1979 teams won back-to-back Group 4 state titles behind steely-eyed guard Billy Culbertson and the 1981 team with Milt Wagner and junior Billy Thompson averaged 104 points.
"We played Pearl Washington that year," Milt Wagner recalled of a visit from the Boys High of Brooklyn superstar.
The 1982 team with Thompson, who was regarded as the nation's best high school player, won the Group 4 state title.
The 1984 team, with Walls averaging 44.1 points - and kissing about a dozen 10-foot bank shots off the glass every game - and Charlotte Hornets star Michael Kidd-Gilchrist's father, Mike Gilchrist, banging the boards, went undefeated and won another Group 4 title.
The 1986 team, featuring sophomores Carstarphen and Denny Brown as well as Donny Walker and the irrepressible Louis Banks, went 31-0 and was ranked No. 1 in the nation by USA Today.
Brown's best memory was Camden's 1986 home game against crosstown rival Woodrow Wilson, the defending Group 3 state champion featuring stars Henry Tuten, Eric Taylor, and Ron Damon.
"We're warming up, and there's less than a minute on the clock and Wilson still hadn't arrived," Brown said. "Now there's like 30 seconds on the clock and the whole Wilson team walks in and they're all wearing shades. They took a couple shots, the buzzer went off, and the game started."
The 1987 team won another Group 4 state title, Turner's seventh in 14 seasons and his last, and the 1988 team lost the state chamionship game by a point to an Elizabeth team with 7-foot Luther Wright.
"I don't think we lost a home game in my four years," Carstarphen said.
The 2000 team with Dajuan Wagner, Milt's son, and Arthur Barclay won the Group 3 state title and the Tournament of Champions.
The next year, Wagner scored a state-record 100 points in a home game against Camden County Tech - and probably could have dropped 120 since he sat out the last four minutes.
Nearly 30 years earlier, Wagner's father was a wide-eyed middle-schooler walking into the gym for the first time.
That's when he heard the sound.
It was the signature "Whoooooooo" from the home crowd when a Camden player took a shot from distance, an anticipatory cheer accompanying the flight of the basketball on its way to the hoop.
Milt Wagner, a 1981 Camden graduate who won a national title at Louisville and an NBA title with the Los Angeles Lakers, was famous for splashing 25-footers in the days before the three-point line.
But he remembers hearing that sound for the first time in the mid-1970s, when Camden star Dan Rucker was launching leather rainbows from well beyond the top of the key.
"That guy, nothing but net," Wagner said.
Forty years later, Milt Wagner can still see it.
He can still hear it, too.
@PhilAnastasia
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