Becky (Olson) Meline is one of the best volleyball players in Coyote history – a two-time all-NCC performer, the 2003 NCC Player of the Year, and holds multiple spots in South Dakota’s record book. Yet, her career at USD almost didn’t even happen.

Let’s start with the fact that Meline never touched a volleyball until the seventh grade. Hard to imagine for a young girl who grew up in Norfolk, Nebraska, two hours from the hub of Husker volleyball. Even now, she finds it nearly impossible to serve underhand while coaching her daughter’s volleyball team because she never learned to do it.

Second, everyone assumed she would play basketball in college. She never understood that assumption, and while she loved the sport and also ran track in high school, there was no doubt in her mind that volleyball was going to be her sport moving forward.

Third, she had verbally committed to play for another college. Fortunately for the Coyotes, that deal began to unravel when it was learned that she stood 5-feet-10-inches.

“They ended up backing out at the last minute because they thought I was too small, that I wouldn’t be tall enough,” said Meline. “I was really left high and dry, but that’s when Coach (Darin) Weber came in. He had just gotten hired so he was late to recruiting and I sent him some footage and he called me right away and wanted me to come up for a visit.

“It was the best thing that could have happened to me because I think about if I would have gone on and played with another college, I wouldn’t have been as happy as I was. I had such a tremendous experience at USD that I would never change. God has a funny way of working things out.”

Things did indeed end up working out – for Meline and for South Dakota. Weber inherited a program that just went an entire decade without winning 10 matches in a season. He and Meline checked that box in year one. As a senior in 2003, the Coyotes were 18-10, their first winning season in nearly 25 years.

As for Meline, she went on to collect multiple accolades. She graduated as the Coyotes’ career leader in kills with 1,450, was the first player in the program to be named conference MVP, and remains one of the top all-rotation players in program history. It is why the invitation to Friday’s ceremony is a no-brainer.

“I am very honored to be joining the Hall of Fame,” said Meline. “Especially getting to watch the team now and seeing that success they’ve had; I feel like my time was when we started moving the program in that direction. The teammates I had and the great coaching staff, we were able to feel like we were really a part of moving the program in a different direction. It means a lot to me to be inducted into the Hall of Fame and to be back on campus.”

If you take away Meline’s success on the court, her time at South Dakota was still an impactful four years filled with heartbreak, loss, and love that continue to influence her life nearly 20 years later. She met her husband, Aaron, at USD and the couple has three children: Brayden, Jordyn, and Skylar. Meline opened her own sports psychology practice in Omaha where the couple lives. That’s a career path she likely would not have pursued if not for a tragic event during her sophomore year.

“That was when we lost one of our teammates, McKenzie Hartwig, to meningitis at our very first tournament,” said Meline. “I’ll never forget the passing of McKenzie. We were in our hotel room and our coaches just told us we needed to pray. But when Coach Weber came in and told us the news, I will never forget the look on everyone’s faces, it just didn’t seem true.

“That night, the coaches went out and bought a bunch of candy and junk food and we sat in the hotel room and just talked about McKenzie. We laughed and cried and just remembered her. After that, we were a very close-knit team.”

A sport psychologist was brought in to support the team shortly after that event and it made a direct impact on Meline. She was intrigued with how much it helped her and inspired her to want to offer that type of support for people and especially athletes moving forward. At first she thought that profession could only thrive in high-population areas on the east and west coasts, but Meline has proven that’s certainly not the case. She continued her schooling at the University of Nebraska-Omaha before starting her own practice.

As for how she met Aaron, that’s an easier story to tell.

“One of my teammates actually introduced us, she just grabbed my arm and grabbed his arm, pulled us together, and told us to chat,” Meline chuckled. “We hung out a couple times and then we were together from there. He played football here and I played volleyball, so it was really fun to go to his games and watch him and then have him at my games watching me.

“It has been an amazing journey since then. We have three incredible children together and it’s going to be so fun to bring them to campus on Friday and show them where mom and dad met and went to school.”

Meline will join the five other Henry Heider Coyote Sports Hall of Fame inductees on Friday for a ceremony to celebrate their accomplishments. The newest class will also be recognized Saturday at halftime of South Dakota’s football game versus Cal Poly.