SLIPPERY ROCK — Jence Rhoads floated the idea to her friends and family.

She tried to explain it as well as she could.

Still, the Slippery Rock High graduate and professional women’s basketball player in Europe got some raised eyebrows and funny looks.

“I bounced it off a lot of people,” Rhoads said of her radical change in course. “I’d say, ‘So, here’s my situation.’”

The situation is this: Rhoads, 25, is walking away from the basketball court and a sport she has played since she could walk.

Her new athletic pursuit is handball, a game her mother, Melinda, played as part of the Unites States women’s handball team in the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

Rhoads traveled to Auburn, Ala., last month for an extensive tryout with Team USA Handball.

She was one of five there to make the national women’s team.

Rhoads said the emphasis in the tryouts was to find better athletes in anticipation for upcoming international competitions.

“I wasn’t really sure going in, but I figured I had nothing to lose,” Rhoads said. “Watching the game and seeing my mom play, I figured it would help, but it didn’t really give me all that much of an advantage.

“I surprised my mom with how well I did at the tryout,” Rhoads added. “It was fun to learn a new game. I’ve played basketball all my life. Basketball had been it. It was fun trying something else and I feel like a kid again.”

Rhoads has been at a crossroads since her second successful basketball season in Romania ended in May.

The Vanderbilt University graduate has played four professional seasons in Europe, winning the Guard of the Year award overseas twice, and averaged more than 13 points per game as a point guard in her career.

That career is at the very least on hold as Rhoads pursues a new passion.

“It’s a once in a lifetime opportunity to play with USA on my chest,” Rhoads said. “It’s been a dream of mine to do that.”

Rhoads will move to Auburn this fall to begin training with the national handball team.

She will also attend graduate school at Auburn University to earn her masters degree in exercise science.

The 2016 Olympics in Brazil is a longshot for Rhoads and the national team, she said.

“The team is in the developmental stage,” Rhoads said. “Unless we make a huge leap in the next year, the goal is the 2020 Olympics.”

In the meantime, Rhoads still has a chance to get one more season of basketball under her belt.

Her agent has lined up an opportunity for Rhoads to play in Puerto Rico in a three-month season that begins in September.

Rhoads said she isn’t sure if she will play there or not.

One thing Rhoads, 25, is sure of, though: she will not be playing basketball this winter for the first time since she was a little girl.

“I don’t know if it really has sunk in yet,” she said. “Obviously, that has been the hardest decision. I love playing basketball. It’s my first love and it’ll always be my first love. But I want to give handball a blank slate and a fair chance.”

Even if some people around her think she is crazy.

“A lot of people are surprised I’m doing this,” Rhoads said, chuckling. “Some people think it’s a little crazy. But most have been very supportive.”