It’s been four months since NIU quarterback Marshall Taylor ended his junior season lying on the Nevada-Las Vegas turf with a broken left ankle.

Taylor, who piled up 209 yards on 14 carries in that season-ending 34-31 Huskie win, has since gone through the arduous task of rehabilitation and is now about three months away from making a complete recovery.

“I predict by the end of June I’ll be able to go through full-contact drills,” the 5-foot-8, 185-pound Taylor said.

If his forecast is on target, Taylor will have recovered two months ahead of trainer Wayne Vaupel’s schedule. The Huskie healer said Taylor would be ready for real football in August. But it would not surprise Vaupel if Taylor was ready sooner.

“Marshall’s been a super person to work with since the first day he got out of the hospital,” Vaupel said.

Despite working with a leg made partly of screws and a metal plate, Taylor has been able to participate in non-contact drills along with the other signal callers since spring practice began two weeks ago.

“When spring drills began, I was surprised to see what I could do,” Taylor said. “Some of the guys say, ‘Hey, you should put the pads on.'”

The speedy QB said he would love to suit up, but that it would be foolish to risk further injury at this stage of his recovery. While Taylor described his ankle as being “pretty pain-free,” he said the muscles in his lower leg still bother him at times.

“We’re trying to fine-tune his rehabilitation,” Vaupel said. “He’s going through what we call sports-specific exercises. He’s familiarizing himself with what he can do. You can tell he’s not quite at full strength.”

Head coach Jerry Pettibone said he was happy with Taylor’s progress so far, but noted his star player still is not 100 percent.

“Marshall’s been able to get out there and do some basic things,” Pettibone said. “He’s limping a little bit on his sore ankle, but he’s got flexibility back.”

Vaupel has put Taylor through a regimen of exercises to build up his leg muscles, including toe raises, squats and resistance work with rubber bands—big ones, not the kind you wrap a newspaper with. Yet, Taylor said exercising has not been the worst part of the last four months.

“I’d say the most difficult part has been mental,” he said. “I don’t want to baby it (his ankle). When you’re in a game, you don’t want to think about keeping people off it.”