It usually means the end of a season for an athlete after a torn ACL, but it doesn’t have to be the end of their career.

Freshman volleyball player Alex Rosignol tore her ACL playing basketball in the summer before her senior year of high school. The injury sidelined her for the whole volleyball season and most of her basketball season.

“I thought SIU was going to quit recruiting me,” Rosignol said. “That’s what I was mainly worried about. I was just so upset and I didn’t think I was going to be able to play sports in college.”

Rosignol said the SIU coaching staff encouraged and helped her through her injury. She said there is still soreness in her knee, but the injury is fully recovered.

“I think there’s improvements every day with her,” coach Justin Ingram said. “She’s incredibly fast laterally. “

Along with volleyball, Rosignol played basketball and ran track for Mount Carmel High School. She said the first thing the coaching staff noticed about her was athleticism.

She said her favorite athletic achievements in high school include breaking the Mount Carmel rebounds record in basketball.

Rosignol holds school records in three track events and finished third in state in the 100-meter dash her freshman year.

As a volleyball player, Rosignol was a three-time team most valuable player, three-time best offensive and best defensive player of the year at Mount Carmel and a 2012 All-State honorable mention. She was on the fence of which sport to play in college, but SIU volleyball was the first team to contact her.

“I was fighting between basketball and volleyball until about my sophomore year,” Rosignol said. “SIU started talking to me and I realized volleyball was what I wanted to do.”

Despite her injury and choice to play volleyball, Rosignol said she will not give up basketball completely. Rosignol said it’s tough to say if she’ll be able to play again, but plans on watching Saluki basketball and her high school team as much as possible.

Ingram said the only skepticism he had with recruiting her was her ACL recovery. He was confident Rosignol would play volleyball.

“She didn’t play high school ball that year, nor did she play club volleyball,” Ingram said. “Really, when she came here in the summer, the last volleyball she played was her junior year in high school.”

Rosignol said she was recruited for all three sports, but always planned on coming to SIU for volleyball so she didn’t go far into the process with other sports or other schools.

She has played in one set this season for the Salukis.

“The other middles are more efficient right now within the block system and within the attack,” Ingram said. “She’s right there. She’s not too far behind.”

Sophomore setter/hitter Meg Viggars said Rosignol has a lot of potential and should stay after practice for extra reps and communicate more with her teammates to earn more playing time.

Rosignol said she is practicing and gaining more experience because she is not used to the higher level of play. She is used to pushing herself though. Rosignol said she had to work extra hard through the recovery because she wanted to be a Saluki.

“She just gets on with it and plays through [the soreness].” Viggars said.

Aaron Graff can be contacted at [email protected], on Twitter @Aarongraff_DE or 536-3311 ext. 256