Men's Water Polo

Coach

Born in San Dimas, Jamie C. Love is a native Californian and, has been in the pool, since he was 2 years old. He first began competing in swimming at the age of 5 for the Bloomington Barracudas Swim Team. He would later move with his family around the San Gabriel Valley competing for local teams such as Covina Aquatics, Gemini Swim Club, and the Arcadia Riptides as an adolescent.

At the age of 15 he began attending Arcadia High School (a three-year high school with 10th through 12th grades at the time). It was as a sophomore at Arcadia High that Jamie began his 30+ years playing water polo. Half-way through his first water polo practice his coaches asked if he would be interested in being a goalkeeper, and he accepted the challenge. Jamie took to the position and quickly progressed from a Junior Varsity player at the beginning of the season having never played before, to passing over both the Varsity substitute and starting goalkeeper to take over the starting position. At the end of his first season playing the sport Jamie was given the Most Improved Player Award. This early start allowed him to ultimately achieve 6 Varsity Letters in both water polo and swimming by the end of his high school athletic career.

Jamie’s water polo goalkeeper and swimming career would continue as a Mountie at Mount San Antonio College and Sagehen at Pomona-Pitzer. At Mt. SAC he would earn First Team All-Conference honors as well as the Coaches Award, and at Pomona-Pitzer he would earn Second Team All-Conference honors. While Jamie was a student at both colleges, he worked for the Mount San Antonio College Student-Athlete Tutoring Program as a Tutorial Facilitator specializing in English, Philosophy, and Art-History.

After earning a bachelor’s degree with a double major in Art and Philosophy, Jamie fist took a position teaching English as a Second Language in Ulsan, South Korea. He would live and work in South Korea for nearly a decade. While living and working in South Korea, Jamie earned a Master of Arts through the Cal State Dominguez Hills Humanities External Degree program (HUX), a distance learning program. After earning his Master’s degree, he took a position teaching Philosophy at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (울산과학기술원).

Missing water polo while living overseas, Jamie showed up at the Munsu Stadium Pool in Ulsan with a water polo ball he had shipped to him from America. With ball in hand he jumped into the facilities diving tank to the surprise of the locals who, unknown to him, had strict rules about the use of the dive tank. The lifeguards urged him in Korean to exit the tank for fear that he would drown since the tank was so deep. Coping with a language barrier, Jamie was able to work out a deal with the Munsu Stadium Pool to teach their lifeguards to play the sport of water polo in exchange for using the dive tank. This led to Jamie being able to take some of the players he taught to visit and play water polo with the student-athletes at the Korea National Sport University (한국체육대학교) in Seoul.

When Jamie returned to America, he began teaching Philosophy & Humanities at numerous local California Community Colleges and would ultimately earn tenure at Citrus College. However, he never lost the desire to play water polo, and from time-to-time was graciously allowed to volunteer his time to help train goalkeepers at Citrus under the watchful eye of college’s Coaching staff. These efforts led to Jamie being twice recognized with the Faculty Scholar-Baller Award by the student-athletes.

When COVID hit with its lock-downs and classes being taught online, Jamie was not able to continue playing with a Master’s water polo group he had begun practicing with in Riverside. All sports were unfortunately shut down. Later, the local water polo club his son attends started a Master’s program once lock-downs were relaxed, and Jamie quickly signed up to play. It was there that he met and was later encouraged by the Crafton Hill’s College Head Water Polo Coach to apply for the Assistant Water Polo Coach position. This was the beginning of his efforts toward the establishment of a tradition of developing exceptional scholar-athletes at the college. Jamie now is embarking on the continuation of this journey to develop a legacy of strong athletics and academics as the Head Men’s Water Polo Coach at Crafton Hill’s College.