Hall of Fame: Bobby Hall (Corona del Mar)

Richard Dunn

For an offensive lineman, Bobby Hall found plenty of glory in

football’s trenches.

As part of the winningest class in Corona del Mar High football

history, Hall started on the line when the Sea Kings won back-to-back CIF

Southern Section Division VI championships in 1988 and ’89.

Prior to his varsity seasons, Hall and his teammates enjoyed

undefeated campaigns on the freshman and sophomore levels, going 18-0 in

two years, before finishing their four-year CdM careers with a 41-3-2

record.

A first-team All-Sea View League offensive lineman his senior year,

Hall was invited to Tustin’s year-end awards banquet as part of an

All-Opponent Team the Tillers celebrated that night.

“I thought it was really cool,” Hall said, “to be invited to their

banquet and be introduced.”

Hall, who later became a star at Orange Coast College and grazed the

cover of the Pirates’ 1991 media guide, was no doubt part of a special

generation at CdM that comes along only once in awhile, a group of

athletes who seem to win every year on every level.

In addition to Danny O’Neil (the quarterback who later transferred to

Mater Dei and became co-MVP of the 1995 Rose Bowl game for Oregon),

Corona del Mar featured players like Jerrott Willard, John Katovsich,

Todd Katovsich, Jeff Jackson, Brian Lucas, Warren Johnson and Weston

Johnson.

“We played together since we were about 10 years old,” Hall said. “Our

class (of 1990) had a lot of good athletes, and that alumni basketball

tournament’s fun. We’ve won it a bunch of times, and we seem to always be

in the finals.”

Hall, referring to the annual Jack Errion Memorial Classic in the

summer, remembers two distinctly different football teams when the Sea

Kings won back-to-back CIF titles.

After dominating the 1988 campaign with a 12-0-2 mark and winning

their first CIF title, the Sea Kings struggled to make the playoffs the

following year. Then, as a wild card, they repeated as Division VI

champions with a 21-10 victory over La Quinta.

“No one anticipated us being there again,” said Hall, whose ’89 squad

lost to Newport Harbor, 8-7, in the regular-season finale as the

defending CIF champions had to cross their fingers all weekend in hopes

of landing a berth as a wild card.

“Once we got in, we were fired up, and everyone believed we were a

better team than our (7-3) record,” added Hall, whose Dave

Holland-coached Sea Kings won four straight in the postseason to record

the only back-to-back CIF football titles in Newport-Mesa District

history.

Hall, who also played basketball and baseball at CdM his junior year,

beefed up to 6-foot-3, 270 pounds at Orange Coast, where the winning

continued.

“When I do reflect back, I was pretty lucky to be surrounded by a lot

of good athletes, because (winning) doesn’t happen to a lot of athletes,”

he said. “They’re on losing team after losing team. I was lucky to be on

winning teams.”

As a freshman at OCC, Hall was a first-team All-Mission Conference

Central Division selection at offensive guard as the Pirates finished 8-3

and played in the 1990 Orange County Bowl, the school’s first bowl

appearance in 15 years.

The following year, Hall repeated his first-team all-conference

laurels, while adding honorable mention JC All-American status, as the

6-4 Bucs played in the K-Swiss Classic at Los Angeles Harbor College.

In six years, Hall’s teams went 55-10-2, after his OCC squads combined

for a two-year 14-7 mark.

His gridiron career continued at USC, but it ended after one redshirt

season. The Trojans that year were stunned by unranked Fresno State,

24-7, in the 1992 Freedom Bowl at Anaheim Stadium.

Hall, who grew up in Newport Beach and played Newport-Mesa Junior

All-American, is the latest honoree in the Daily Pilot Sports Hall of

Fame.

Hall, who has trimmed down to a svelte 210 pounds, lives in Newport

and is a sales big wig for Quest software. He’s planning to get married

to Courtney Danehy on May 25, 2002.