After an ankle injury cut her volleyball career short at Marquette, Megan Markowski decided to transfer to NIU and focus on being a student.

The junior middle blocker did not have immediate intentions of picking up volleyball again.

That was in January. Fast-forward nine months and Markowski is now a starter on a Huskies volleyball team that is off to a 10-1 start heading into MAC play this week.

“I was just going to come here to get a degree in communication,” Markowski said.

The Glen Ellyn native was friends with Joe Bruzinski, who was a student assistant with NIU when she transferred. Bruzinski mentioned her to NIU coach Ray Gooden, who asked Markowski to play on the spring squad.

Markowski is third on the Huskies for kills per game with a 2.31 average, while averaging 1.09 blocks per game.

“She’s brought a level of consistency to this team, which is something we were missing last year,” NIU senior outside hitter Amanda Newlin said. “Defensively she’s frustrating to play against, but she’s great to have on your side.”

When Markowski graduated from St. Francis High School in 2001, NIU wasn’t one of her options. Marquette was the choice over Illinois State, Murray State, Wisconsin-Milwaukee and MAC favorite Ball State. All signs pointed to Marquette for Markowski.

“I grew up in the Milwaukee area and both of my parents and my aunt and uncle went to Marquette,” Markowski said. “I knew that’s where I wanted to go for a while and when volleyball became available, it just made sense.”

Thinking she was done playing volleyball, Markowski transferred in the spring to NIU. After leaving the Marquette team to have surgery on her ankle, Markowski wasn’t allowed back on the team because of disagreements with the MU coach. In last year’s fall semester, Markowski had to pay tuition at MU. Because of financial reasons and Markowski wanting to be closer to her family, she decided to transfer to NIU.

She played with the NIU team for a few matches during the off-season. Markowski, who was one of just five on the spring roster – two players were injured and a transfer and four freshmen hadn’t arrived yet – felt that the way those five played was a sign of the success they’re having during the regular season.

“We only had five girls on the team, but we played well,” Markowski said. “A lot of us had the same feeling about the team. We just said, ‘Imagine what we can do once we get everybody on team here.’ We had a feeling we’d be good.”