Graham Bensinger • E-mail

Reggie Love's athletic aspirations are on hold.

Long gone are the days captaining Duke basketball and also starring on the football team. And the 26-year-old's NFL dreams are long over, having been cut by the Green Bay Packers and released by the Dallas Cowboys.

Then, rather than accepting a lucrative offer from Goldman Sachs, he took a gamble and elected to take a job paying under $30,000 per year in the mailroom of freshman Senator Barack Obama.

A year later, Obama selected Love as his personal aide. Saying that Love is “like a little brother to me,” Obama and Love were rarely apart during the 21-month campaign that ended with Obama being elected President of the United States.

Now, as a part of President-elect Obama’s transition team, Love spoke via phone to go "In Depth" with Graham Bensinger.

Graham Bensinger: I want to go back to Election Day. Tuesday, Nov. 4. Take me through your day from waking up that morning.

Reggie Love: It was a good day. We got in late from the final rally that was held in Manassas, VA on Monday night. We got in at about 3 a.m. We started off pretty early on Tuesday. President-elect Obama went to vote. We flew down to Indiana for a quick stop in Indianapolis to meet with some of the volunteers who were out canvassing in that area. They were also phone banking. We spent about an hour there and then flew back to Chicago for our Election Day basketball game. After that, it was just pretty much waiting, man. It went by pretty quick. I actually might have fallen asleep for 20 or 30 minutes because I was tired.

Bensinger: Where were you when you got the news Senator Obama had won?

Love: When they officially called it, we were at the Hyatt Hotel in downtown Chicago with the senator and his friends and family from Hawaii and Michelle’s family. They were all at the hotel sitting around and watching the results. It was exciting!

Bensinger: What was your reaction?

Love: I think even still to this day what has been accomplished hasn’t quite hit yet. It’s so overwhelming that I really haven’t had time to sit back and let it sink in yet. Like the campaign, the next [transition] phase of this is a lot of work because there’s a lot that has to be put in place. There’s not much time to sit around and reflect.

Bensinger: Prior to being part of the transition team, your most recent role was as the personal aid/body man. How would you describe your duties?

AFP/Getty Images President-elect Barack Obama, left, speaks to personal assistant Reggie Love, center, and advisor Eugene Kang on a plane from Chicago to Washington on Nov. 10 ahead of a meeting with President George W. Bush and First Lady Laura Bush at the White House.

Love: The job doesn’t come with a description. It depends on the candidate and who had the job before you. For me, during the campaign, it was pretty simple. After time and practice, and after doing it for 22-consecutive months, you kind of get the hang of it. For example, I was responsible for making sure he had his briefings or knew where he was going or that he packed enough clothes for a 10 day trip or that he was eating breakfast and lunch and dinner or making sure there was a place for him to get in a quick workout when we got up in the morning. Also, when he’s really tired, I sometimes had to wake him up in the morning which is not always a lot of fun!

Bensinger: What did that entail?

Craig Jones / Getty Images file Reggie Love makes a slam dunk during the ACC Tournament against Maryland in March, 2001.

Love: It really depends — some days are easier than others. Most of the days are pretty easy, but some days, you try to call him a couple times and the phone is off the hook. So you have to stumble into his room and say, “Excuse me, sir, we gotta get going!” But usually, he pops right out and says, “Hey, another day, gotta go to work!” He’s a great guy to campaign with.

Bensinger: I heard President-elect Obama say this somewhere ... That sometimes it is the other way around and it’s him waking you up.

Love: There were a couple times. I think, maybe in Vegas, he had to poke his head in my room and ask me if I was going to the gym.

Bensinger: How often do you play basketball?

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Love: We didn’t play as much during the general election as we did in the primaries just because there were a lot of debates and we didn’t want him to have a black eye or a broken nose when he’s going to go in front of 90 million people. We played on almost every primary election. I think we only played two or three times during the general election.

Bensinger: How was the game on Election Day?

Love: You know, we weren’t that great. I think we were a little bit tired. I think our team won one of three games. We weren’t too happy about it, but it was a box that we had to check.

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