Annual football camp features Alaska products with NFL ties

It’s not often that a football player in Alaska has the opportunity to learn and interact with professionals in their sport, especially in their home state.

But more than 100 high school players from across the state had that chance during the 10th annual Solstice Lineman Camp with Chris Kuper last week at East High School in Anchorage.

Kuper is a former NFL standout offensive lineman for the Denver Broncos and currently is the Minnesota Vikings offensive line coach. Kuper, an Anchorage native and former Dimond High School star, has been returning to his hometown for the past eight years to help direct the clinic started 10 years ago by his high school coach, Alaska legend Duncan Schackleford. Kuper helped a Lynx squad coached by Schackleford win the 2001 ASAA state title.

“It’s awesome, because there just wasn’t stuff like this when I was (in high school). There was the Palmer camp,” Kuper said, referring to the All-Alaska Football Camp which dates back to the early 1990s at Palmer High School. “But you had to leave state to go to other camps, and you couldn’t do that very often. I think I got to one out-of-state camp.”

Kuper has been joined in recent years by another Alaska product with NFL ties, Junior Aumavae, a Palmer High School graduate and former Moose football star who enjoyed stints with the Dallas Cowboys and New York Jets.

Not only does the clinic feature two Alaska standouts who wore an NFL uniform, but the three-day camp is also free for participants.

Kuper said a similar clinic could cost anywhere from $600 to $800, but organizers are committed to keeping the camp free of charge each summer.

“To be able to include everybody is as important as anything, because there's a lot of guys out here that couldn't afford that,” Kuper said.

Kuper said there has been a great deal of community support, with a long list of people and businesses eager to continue to provide this opportunity for Alaska players.

Each participant receives a camp T-shirt and there is a dinner on the final day for everyone. Water and Gatorade are provided, and organizers gather equipment from local schools.

“It's pretty bare bones. But that's how I want it to be. It's not going to be one of these big camps, or else it becomes a business. And I prefer to not be a business,” Kuper said.

The clinic is designed specifically for linemen. Both Kuper and Aumavae were two-way standouts in high school. Kuper, a team captain with the Broncos, played guard in college and North Dakota and in the pros. Aumavae was a defensive lineman in college and the pros.

“A lot of the stuff that Chris and I learned, hopefully we can share that with these kids, the different techniques that we've learned. To be able to kind of share it with these kids is great, because we didn't have that growing up,” Aumavae said. “We didn't have something like this to be able to kind of get coached by pros. And so what we hoped to do is kind of share how to become a pro, but also how to execute that as a pro. It's more than just football as well.”

In addition to the skills and technique, Aumavae said mentorship is a big part as well.

“We believe football is the greatest sport in the world and it teaches more than just football. It teaches about life, which is kind of what prepared us for past football. We like to just kind of give that message back,” Aumavae said.

Kuper, Aumavae and a handful of local coaches worked with the players from 3-7 p.m. on three consecutive days.

“It’s not easy. It's four hours of just work. I think it builds character, it builds toughness, and it builds the type of players that you want playing in the trenches,” Kuper said.

The 2025 camp attracted players from across the state and as far away as Barrow.

Contact Frontiersman managing editor Jeremiah Bartz at editor@frontiersman.com.