Prison athletic director still serving community
By Charles WhisnandNevada Appeal Sports Editor
Carson City, Nevada
Jan. 10, 2008
(Includes slight editing by Wildcatville.)
Nevada State Prison Recreation Specialist Rob Love has been coordinating athletic activities and operating the gym at the prison for 30 years.
Chances are if you've lived, grown up or raised children in Carson City over the last 30 years, your life has been touched in some way by Rob Love.
Simply put, thousands of children and adults in Carson City have had their lives affected by Love in one way or another over those 30 years. Along with helping Carson City's residents during that time, Love has also spent his entire career helping the inmates at Nevada State Prison.
For the past 30 years and seven months, Love has served as the Nevada State Prison's athletic and recreation specialist.
He's now considering retirement - and while his fondness of Hawaii and golf along with his wife's prodding is calling him - Love said he doesn't know if he's ready to ride off into the Hawaiian sunset just yet. "I still love my job," Love said. "I can answer that right now as far as when I'll retire."
Love and his wife, Sharon, who is already retired, have a home in Hawaii and Love admitted his wife would like him to retire. Plus, he's being pulled by his love of golf and Hawaii.
Love served on the football coaching staffs of such coaches as Paul Croghan and Bob Bateman at Carson. But he admitted he gave up his coaching at CHS when he discovered golf.
"I kind of fell in love with golf," he said. "My love is golf and Hawaii. That's where I focus a lot of my attention."
And while Love plans to go to Hawaii for the Pro Bowl next month, his focus is still on his service in the community and at the prison as well.
"It doesn't seem like I've been here 30 years," he said. "I love Northern Nevada. (I'm) trying to decide when I want to leave."
Love is a Las Vegas native and had such a distinguised athletic career at Western High, he became the second person ever to be inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.
Nevada State Prison Recreation Specialist Rob Love has been coordinating athletic activities and operating the gym at the prison for 30 years.
Chances are if you've lived, grown up or raised children in Carson City over the last 30 years, your life has been touched in some way by Rob Love.
Simply put, thousands of children and adults in Carson City have had their lives affected by Love in one way or another over those 30 years. Along with helping Carson City's residents during that time, Love has also spent his entire career helping the inmates at Nevada State Prison.
For the past 30 years and seven months, Love has served as the Nevada State Prison's athletic and recreation specialist.
He's now considering retirement - and while his fondness of Hawaii and golf along with his wife's prodding is calling him - Love said he doesn't know if he's ready to ride off into the Hawaiian sunset just yet. "I still love my job," Love said. "I can answer that right now as far as when I'll retire."
Love and his wife, Sharon, who is already retired, have a home in Hawaii and Love admitted his wife would like him to retire. Plus, he's being pulled by his love of golf and Hawaii.
Love served on the football coaching staffs of such coaches as Paul Croghan and Bob Bateman at Carson. But he admitted he gave up his coaching at CHS when he discovered golf.
"I kind of fell in love with golf," he said. "My love is golf and Hawaii. That's where I focus a lot of my attention."
And while Love plans to go to Hawaii for the Pro Bowl next month, his focus is still on his service in the community and at the prison as well.
"It doesn't seem like I've been here 30 years," he said. "I love Northern Nevada. (I'm) trying to decide when I want to leave."
Love is a Las Vegas native and had such a distinguised athletic career at Western High, he became the second person ever to be inducted into the school's Hall of Fame.
He decided to play football at Linfield College in Oregon, an NAIA school at the time, a decision that may have not made that much sense on the surface since Love had dreams of playing pro football.
"I had aspirations to play pro football," he said. "In hindsight I'm glad I went to Linfield."
He majored in physical education at Linfield where he graduated in 1976 and was set to take a teaching job in Oregon. But he came home to be with his ailing mother.
Love was then set to take a teaching job at Clark High in Las Vegas. But a mutual friend through Linfield, Tim Smith*, convinced him to take the test for his current position and even bought him a plane ticket to make sure he would make it up here to take the test.
After taking the test and being offered the job here, Love had another decision to make.
"Do I want to stay in Vegas or do I want to come up here?" he asked. In 1977, he decided to come to Carson City. "I've been here ever since," he said.
In addition, Love helps out Carson City Recreation Director Joel Dunn in the city's youth basketball league. Love supervises the officials for the league and also serves as a coach and an official in the league. He also helps supervise the city's adult softball leagues and in the past has supervised the city's adult men's basketball league.
As the prison's athletic director, Love supervises all the athletic and recreation programs for all the inmates ranging from weight training to intramural programs in basketball, volleyball, softball and soccer. In basketball, Love supervises a total of about 20 teams in various leagues at the prison.
A unique characteristic of the league is the games involving the inmates are officiated by other inmates. Love said there are inmates who have gone on to work as officials once they got out of prison.
"It's a serious asset to the institution as far as containing the daily tension going on," said Love about the athletic program.
He said the "No 1 goal is to help them occupy their time in a constructive manner" along with maintaining the health and wellness of the inmates. "All this stuff helps them do those things," Love said.
Love said he couldn't imagine what the prison would be like without programs like the athletic, education and prison industry programs. "I would hate to think what kind of problems we would have here," Love said.
As part of his duties, Love supervises as many as 100 inmates at a time in the prison gym and he said he has never run into serious problems.
"There's no trouble here," he said. "The gym is a positive place. I have no fear of being in here. Respect that goes a long way. How you treat people."
Whenever he's had to discipline an inmate he's never had a problem, Love said. "It's very rewarding when guys get out of here," he said. "I'd like to think I had something to do about changing their behavior."
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*Note from Wildcatville. Tim Smith graduated from Linfield in 1970. He attended Linfield after graduating from Serra Catholic High School in Salem, Ore. He lettered in football for Linfield in the 1967, 1968 and 1969 seasons. He died at age 34 in February 1981
