Robin Reder
Baseball/Basketball/Coach (1973-1975)
Leader and integral part of 1974 Skyway basketball champs
All-Skyway performer on 1975 conference champion baseball team
Key member of 1975 Region IV 45-team Tournament runner-up
Member of 1980 Men’s Fastpitch Softball National Champions
Every successful team has at least one player who consistently performs the tasks that don’t show up in the scorebook. The player who shows grit, determination and toughness, intangibles that rub off on their teammates and helps form the culture of a winning team. Robin Reder was that player and then some for Chiefs’ basketball and baseball teams in the early 1970’s.
Reder was a stellar three-sport athlete in football, basketball and baseball at Aurora East High School, where he is a member of the Tomcats’ Sports Hall of Fame. The 5’4” guard was a key reserve on legendary coach Ernie Kivisto’s 1972 squad that finished third in the state. He graduated in 1973 and then brought that winning pedigree to Waubonsee.
Reder helped lead the Chiefs’ 1974 basketball team to the Skyway Conference Championship. His sophomore year he represented Waubonsee on the hardwood in the North-South All-Star game. In the spring, he played shortstop and second base for the Chiefs’ baseball team, earning All-Skyway honors as a sophomore. In an era when only wood bats were used, Reder still batted over .300 and stole 27 bases to help the Chiefs go undefeated in Skyway play to win the college’s first ever conference baseball championship in 1975. That team went on to win a Sectional crown and reached the Region IV Tournament title game, back when all 45 junior colleges in Illinois participated in one division. The 1975 team, which also had a school record 10-game winning streak that stood until 2010, was inducted into Waubonsee’s Hall of Fame in 2011.
Reder went on to Aurora University (AU) where he also played baseball and basketball, earning the Spartans’ MVP award on the court his junior year. He graduated from AU in 1977 with a degree in Education and returned to Waubonsee to serve as Dave Randall’s first assistant baseball coach. Around that time, he began playing major fastpitch softball and was a key member of the Aurora Home Savings & Loan team that won the International Softball Congress (ISC) National Championship in 1980. Reder later took over as player/manager of the nationally ranked Aurora Dolan & Murphy Shamrocks team in the late 1980’s, a role he still holds. He has helped them qualify for the ISC National Tournament nearly every year over the last three decades, and remains involved with the Aurora Fastpitch Softball Association still today.
Reder was a teacher and coach in the Aurora East School District for four years and then switched sides of town, working for the Aurora West School District for three years. In 1987, he moved over to the Indian Prairie School District, teaching and coaching for the next 27 years at Hill Middle School, Still Middle School, and Granger Middle School where he served as Athletic Director for a time. Reder retired in 2014 and these days can often be found at any number of area golf courses and numerous local sporting events, including Waubonsee basketball games. He and his wife Bonnie live in Aurora and have three grown children, daughter Danielle, and sons Ryne and Robert, and two grandsons Henry and Emmett.