Featured Story

Confident 'Ro-Ro' left mark on Concordia

By Jacob Knabel on Aug. 2, 2024 in Women's Basketball

Elizabeth Rhoden arrived in Seward for the start of the 2000-01 academic year in style, motoring into town in a Honda Pilot with Texas plates that read, “RoRo.” That’s right, the native of Friendswood, Texas, came with a built-in nickname. To this day, former coaches and teammates remember “Ro” as someone who brought confidence and a fun and engaging personality to a Concordia Women’s Basketball program that was about to explode on a national scale.

Every basketball team could use a lead guard like Ro, who exuded a level of confidence that bordered on cockiness. She sometimes even wore headbands with the opposing team’s colors in a show of gamesmanship, an act she laughs about 20 years later.

But the Ro people remember from the latter stages of her Concordia career took time to develop. As she recalls, “I’m going from high school where I was the best basketball player to walk the court at this small school. Then I go to college where I’m playing with girls who are much better than me. That made me realize I had to work harder and put more effort into it. My freshman year was a big learning curve. I never lifted weights in high school or did any of that. I had to stay fit and do what Coach (Micah) Parker asked. It was a big change for me.”

By the time Elizabeth (married name Dillingham) finished her career at the close of the fall semester of 2004, she had left a mark that made her worthy of induction into the Concordia Athletics Hall of Fame. She had piled up 1,337 points (top 10 in program history at the time), 492 assists and 230 steals while leading the women’s basketball program to a combined 92 wins over her final three seasons. In a further display of her supreme athletic talents, Ro even played a year of soccer and earned First Team All-GPAC accolades as a defender.

One of the best point guards to ever wear the colors, Ro had a way of bringing a team together. Ro’s own confidence helped lift up others around her. She had all the traits a coach would want in a point guard. Said current Concordia Associate Director of Athletics Angela Muller, who coached Ro as an assistant, “She was a contagious leader who carried herself with an obvious swagger. She was the lone senior her senior year and she understood the responsibility she held as our point guard. She capitalized on her ability and involved all of her teammates.”

As a high school athlete, Ro excelled not just in basketball but also in soccer and track and field. Undoubtedly, Ro could have succeeded as a multi-year star in college soccer, but there was just something about the game of basketball that triggered her competitiveness and love of sport and camaraderie (as exemplified by the basketball bond shared with her best friend Emily). While scoring 40-plus points in one of the signature games of her high school career, Ro appeared validated in her future decision. As the basketball kept pouring through the net that day, one of her teammates could be heard shouting, “Ro-Ro!” from the bench. It stuck.

If it was going to be basketball, the next question was: where at? Ro visited schools in her home state such as Lamar University, but it turned out that a certain school in eastern Nebraska felt most like home. A family friend named Cheri Aliu, a year older than Elizabeth, had gone north to Concordia. Ro heard about the school and decided it was worth a look. After then Bulldog coach Micah Parker saw film of Ro, he expressed interest in having her attend a camp in Seward.

Recalls Elizabeth, “When I went to camp at Concordia, it felt right. It was a small school, small town with Christian priorities. I really liked Coach Parker and the girls who were a grade above me. In my gut, I knew that was where I needed to go. It was also exciting to go where no one from my high school had gone before. A lot of kids would go to A&M or Baylor. It was nice to go somewhere different.”

It made sense for someone with Ro’s personality to neglect the path of least resistance. She was ready to take her game to the next level – and to a place where she would be pushed to be better on and off the court. As someone who never sat on the bench in high school, Ro expected she would immediately earn a significant varsity role. To her surprise, she sometimes played junior varsity and she averaged 2.5 points per game as a freshman on the varsity team.

Ro remembered watching the team’s 2000-01 highlight video after the season and not seeing any plays that featured herself. In her mind, that was never going to happen again. Academically, Ro was also surprised to learn that her straight-B’s were actually bringing down the team’s grade-point average. It wasn’t long before she became an NAIA Scholar-Athlete.

“I was like, ‘Oh, basketball doesn’t count before school?’” Rhoden said in recalling a meeting with Coach Parker. “That’s when it really set my priorities straight that it’s Christ, family, school and then it’s basketball. I will always remember him saying that was the priority list.”

Lessons were clearly learned. Ro’s role increased significantly her sophomore year as she became the first player off the bench for a team that finished at 28-6 overall. The swag was coming back quickly. The 5-foot-10 Texan found superstardom as a junior when she averaged 13.7 points, 4.9 assists, 3.5 rebounds and 2.7 steals per game. That 2002-03 team started 33-0 and marched to the national semifinals as one of the greatest squads in the history of the school.

Those who went up against Ro likely saw her as the arch villain – because she was that good and that confident in her game. There were individual rivalries within the larger team rivalries. Ro and an opposing guard from Hastings engaged in classic battles and one Morningside player actually kept a picture of Ro in her locker room, as the star Bulldog later found out. That particular Morningside player used that picture as motivation as if to say, ‘I can’t slack because Elizabeth is getting better.’

Photos in Concordia’s archives show that Ro truly must have had a locker full of colorful headbands. If she was playing Doane, she wore an orange headband. She was trolling before people knew what the term even meant. As she recalls, the Nebraska Wesleyan head coach even told her, ‘nice headband’ prior to a game. It was part of her signature. That was just Ro being Ro.

Says Angela Muller, “Everyone wanted to participate in what Ro-Ro was doing on the court. She did everything you asked. She could adlib. She could drive to the basket and slash to the basket. She had a personality that followed her. She got the crowd fired up. She got her teammates fired up. She got us coaches fired up. I just liked her ability to involve everyone in the game. She was a constant threat.”

Ro’s game stood out even on teams with other stars such as Sarah Harrison, Keyna Kobza and Kari Saving. As a senior, Ro produced big games that included 13 points and six assists in a win over No. 1 Dakota Wesleyan, 12 assists in a victory over No. 2 Morningside, eight assists and four steals in a win at No. 1 Hastings and 21 points in a national round of 16 win over Tennessee Wesleyan. The rivalry clashes with Hastings were especially memorable as the two sides were greeted by packed houses and sometimes throngs of tailgating fans.

Ro was certainly part of that attraction. She compelled fans by the way she entertained – and she even played a role in recruiting the great Kari Saving to Concordia.

Said Ro, “Kari was from Kansas and Coach Parker was recruiting her really hard. He was like, ‘Will you please call her and tell her how great it is here?’ So that’s exactly what I did. I called her on the phone and just talked to her about life at Concordia. A couple months later there was a news article that said, ‘A call from above.’ That call from above was me.”

As a teammate, Ro had your back. There was an instance in her junior season when new head coach Todd Voss (an assistant under Parker) made Ro run at a shootaround because she had eaten a doughnut at the hotel breakfast. Three seniors had also eaten donuts, but none of them stepped forward to join Ro in sprints up and down the court. Ro smiles about it now as she remembers how she glared at those seniors while running that day. As she said, “I took one for the team.”

As the basketball career concluded after the 2003-04 season, Ro decided to give soccer a try. She had one more semester to complete as a double major in Journalism and Communications. Ro tried out and impressed then coach Bill Schranz enough to reward her with a scholarship. And so, the natural athlete found herself earning First Team All-GPAC honors in multiple sports as a collegiate athlete.

In her adult life, Ro moved back near her hometown and is a Houston resident along with her husband Taylor and their children. The memories of Concordia will stick with her, especially now that she’s forced to recall some of them more specifically with a Hall of Fame speech to be delivered in September. Ro likely will never forget the way her not-so-bashful mother used to sing every word of ‘Who Let the Dogs Out’ at Concordia games. As Ro tells the story, that same personality that her teammates would remember from 20 years ago shines through. During her time at Concordia and beyond, Ro became a lot more than just a highlight reel.

“I wanted to be on the highlight video,” Elizabeth says in reference to her eye-opening freshman season. “So I stayed in Seward the summer between my freshman and sophomore year and worked out with Coach Parker every single day. He was so awesome. He would rebound for me for an hour every day and we would do one-on-one practices. That’s what pushed me over the edge to be a little bit better. That’s my message – put in the effort and the practice if you want to see change in everything you do. If you put in the effort, it will pay off.”