Mark Majkrzak knew that someday he wanted to become an NCAA Division-I men’s basketball coach.

It was a dream he always wanted but never thought was realistic enough to happen, especially with the success he was having as the head coach at D-II Northern Michigan.

“It’s kind of like becoming an astronaut or like a movie star, like yeah you want to do it, but most people don’t,” Majkrzak said. “I think what helped me deal with that was that I was very happy not being a Division-I coach. That was never the thing.”

But come Tuesday, the Elkhart, Wisconsin, native had his dream come true. And it happened to be granted by the team he spent hours playing with on the NBA 2K franchise mode.

On Tuesday, Majkrzak was introduced as the 30th head men’s basketball coach of NIU at the NIU Convocation Center. He comes to DeKalb after spending the last seven years as the coach at Northern Michigan. He also coached at Bryant & Stratton College for a season before joining the Wild.

He comes into a situation in which NIU hasn’t had the best track record in recently. Since their last NCAA Tournament berth in 1996, the Huskies have only had four winning seasons, with the most recent one in 2019-2020, when they went 18-13. They’ve only topped 20 wins in a season once in that stretch, going 21-13 in 2015-16.

So does he think he’s the right guy to turn the program around?

“I’d quote [Indiana coach] Curt Cignetti and say ‘I win, Google me,’ but up until a week ago, I didn’t have a Wikipedia page, so it’s kind of hard to do that,” Majkrzak said.

It won’t be the first time that Majkrzak has been hired with the task of turning a program around. Northern Michigan hadn’t been to a D-II NCAA tournament since 2000 and hadn’t won a Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference title since 1993 when he was hired in 2019.

In his final four seasons there, he led the Wild to four consecutive conference titles, as well as four straight tournament appearances. He finished his tenure with a 136-73 mark, which included four consecutive 20-win seasons.

“That first year, we were picked dead last in the league and ended up going 13-17,” Majkrzak said. “Is that what I want to have happen here? No. But the fact that I’ve gone through the process of taking over at a place that everyone said I couldn’t win at and found a way to make them into a perennial contender, that gives me a lot more confidence going into this process than maybe if I had only been at a place that has always won.”

The Huskies parted ways with fifth-year coach Rashon Burno on March 7, following the end of a 9-21 season, including going 4-14 in their final season in the Mid-Atlantic Conference. And it didn’t take long for Majkrzak to have his name associated with NIU. The school announced his hiring on March 17, just 10 days later.

“We needed somebody hungry, and this cat was hungry,” NIU Vice President and Athletic Director Sean Frazier said. “He saw this as an opportunity to take the next evolution. That hunger is something that not everyone has. He’s got it.

“I can’t tell you how many social media messages and emails we got about him, though. It was the worst-kept secret that he was our guy.”

Majkrzak is known for his efficient offenses. Northern Michigan led the nation in Division II and only trailed Illinois for the fewest turnovers per game in the country. It’s that sort of play that he hopes to bring to NIU and, hopefully, see immediate results.

“If you can marry the toughness and grit of being a good defensive rebounding team with a beautiful offense, that’s how you win championships,” Majkrzak said. “Short term, we’re going to be a lot more competitive just because we’re not going to do things that lose games, and I think that’s going to be a great starting point.”

Majkrzak feels it’s an opportune time for change to come for the Huskies. NIU will be competing in the Horizon League next season after spending the past 29 years in the MAC.

“This is a time where I honestly feel like we have everything we have to win championships here,” he said. “I feel like moving to the Horizon League is the smartest move NIU has ever made in terms of athletically in the midwest. There’s a lot of people excited and a lot of people that think we’re in a good spot now.”

Majkrzak also noted the importance of recruiting locally for the Huskies. With multiple connections between AAU teams as well as recruiting multiple midwestern players up at Northern Michigan, he does not doubt that he can find the same success with the most resources he’s had in his career.

“This is going to be a lot more fun recruiting regionally for me compared to anyone else because these are kind of my people,” he said. “I’ve been around that talent; the difference now is if we can find that same talent. And as long as we can work hard and can evaluate better than everyone else, my hope is that the resources we have will attract even more guys and maybe even keep them around even longer.”

Can he find the same level of success at the D-I level? That remains to be seen.

One thing is certain, though. He has the confidence of those who brought him to DeKalb.

“We had a long list of what we wanted, and we got it done,” Frazier said. “I feel really comfortable with that, and I’m excited for the future. I think at the end of the day, we have done some things to right some of the more challenging things for us in this particular hire.”