Longtime free SPORT Clinic to close

A free sports medicine clinic in Riverside is about to disappear — and that matters because it filled a gap most school athletic programs still struggle with. The SPORT Clinic gave student-athletes quick, early-morning care before school and practice, often at no cost to families. Now that run is ending. The clinic is set to close on June 15, 2026, after Riverside Medical Clinic decided to discontinue the program following a fiscal review. ### What exactly is closing? The SPORT Clinic is a long-running Riverside sports medicine program that treated local student-athletes, especially from Riverside and the wider Inland Empire. Its model was simple but unusual — free care, early hours, and a focus on getting injured athletes cared for, more like a community safety net built around sports. ### Why is it closing now? The immediate reason is financial. Riverside Medical Clinic reviewed the program and notified Jim Clover, the clinic’s longtime director, that the sports medicine program would be discontinued. That means this was not a slow fade or a retirement announcement dressed up as news. The parent medical organization made a budget decision, and the clinic’s June 15 closing date followed from that. ### Who is Jim Clover? Clover is basically the person most closely identified with the clinic. He came to Riverside in 1981, coordinated the SPORT Clinic for decades, and built a reputation that stretched well beyond one campus or one school district. His public bios show the same pattern at Riverside Medical Clinic. ### How big was the clinic’s reach? Bigger than “one local clinic” makes it sound. Riverside Sport Hall of Fame materials say the clinic cared for athletes from more than 40 high schools and colleges. That helps explain why the closure lands as a regional story, not just a workplace change. If one place becomes the default stop for coaches, trainers, schools, and families over time, it becomes a problem. ### Why did the early-morning model matter? Because sports injuries do not happen on a neat office-hours schedule. A teenager tweaks a knee on Friday night, and the useful window for decisions is often the next morning — not two weeks later. The clinic’s early access made it easier to sort the small injuries from the serious ones, steer athletes toward rehab, and keep schools from guessing at a plan. ### Does this mean Clover is done? No — that is the part people might get wrong. The clinic is closing, but Clover is not disappearing from sports medicine. His current professional pages still show him teaching, consulting, and running Clover Enterprises and the SPORT Foundation, and he is still active. ### What’s the bigger loss here? It is the loss of a very specific kind of local infrastructure. Plenty of regions have doctors, urgent care, and physical therapy. Far fewer have a trusted, low-friction place built specifically for student-athletes, tied into schools, and accessible to families piecing together options on their own. ### Bottom line The June 15 closure ends a 45-year run that shaped how Riverside-area athletes got treated after injuries. The legacy part is real — but so is the gap it leaves behind.