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Butler Bulldogs – Gordon Hayward
Hayward was listed as an unranked three-star prospect on the recruiting website Rivals.com. He accepted a scholarship offer from Butler University, coached by Brad Stevens, despite late interest from Purdue and Michigan.
As a freshman in 2008–09, Hayward averaged 13.1 points and 6.5 rebounds per game. He was named Horizon League Newcomer of the Year, and selected to the Horizon League All-Newcomer Team and the All-Horizon League First Team. The Butler Bulldogs won the Horizon League regular-season title. In the championship game of the 2009 Horizon League Men’s Basketball Tournament, Butler lost to Cleveland State. Butler received an at-large bid to the 2009 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament and lost in the First Round against the LSU Tigers.
In 2009–10, Hayward was nominated for various preseason All-America teams and Player of the Year awards. Hayward averaged 15.5 points and 8.2 rebounds per game as a sophomore. The Butler Bulldogs won both the Horizon League regular-season title and the 2010 Horizon League Men’s Basketball Tournament. He was named the Horizon League Player of the Year and selected to the All-Horizon League First Team. Hayward was also selected AP All-American Honorable Mention and ESPN Third-team Academic All-American.
Butler lost to Duke in the championship game of the 2010 NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament. In the final seconds, Hayward attempted a game-winning, buzzer-beating, half-court shot, which hit the backboard and rim, and bounced away. The shot is considered one of the most well-known plays in NCAA tournament history. Hayward was selected to the All-Tournament Team.
While the Fieldhouse provided a nationally acclaimed setting for Butler athletics, it was Paul D. “Tony” Hinkle, credited with inventing the orange basketball, who brought national recognition to the school as a coach and athletic administrator. He came to Butler in 1921 and remained with the University until his death in 1992. Hinkle served as a teacher, coach and athletic administrator for nearly half a century and compiled more than 1,000 victories with the school’s football, basketball and baseball teams. The Bulldogs have carried on the winning traditions set forth by Hinkle. In the past decade, Butler teams have captured 26 conference championships (in four different leagues). The Bulldogs have made appearances in NCAA National Championship Tournaments in men’s and women’s basketball, men’s soccer, volleyball, men’s cross country, lacrosse, and baseball. Butler won the James J. McCafferty trophy, awarded annually by the conference for all-sports excellence based on conference championship points, five times, including three-straight from 1996–97 to 1998–99 and back-to-back years in 2001–02 and 2002–03.
College Sports Established
1919
Location
Indianapolis, Indiana
College Name
Butler University
Collegiate History
1973 – Present / NCAA Division 1
1921 – 1973 / University Division of the NCAA
1919 – 1921 / Athletic Association of the United States
Conference History
2013 – Present / Big East Conference
2012 – 2013 / Atlantic 10 Conference
1993 – 2012 / Horizon League
1978 – 1992 / Midwestern Collegiate Conference
1951 – 1977 / Indiana Collegiate Conference
1944 – 1950 / Mid-American Conference
1932 – 1943 / Missouri Valley Conference
Nickname
Bulldogs – Prior to 1919, Butler’s athletic teams were known as the “Christians,” but numerous losses in the 1919 football season caused Butler’s followers to grow weary of the nickname. During the week leading up to Butler’s game with the heated rival Franklin “Baptists,” Butler Collegian editor Alex Cavins and his staff, which included cartoonist George Dickson, decided something “hot” must be conceived for the school’s weekly pep session.
About that time, the mascot of a Butler fraternity – a bulldog named Shimmy (you couldn’t shake him), wandered into the Collegian office. An idea was born. The next school paper came out with a big Page One cartoon showing Shimmy the bulldog, labeled “Butler,” taking a bite out of the pants seat of a figure labeled John the Baptist. The caption was: “Bring on That Platter, Salome!”
NCAA Championships
Baseball 0
Men’s Basketball 0
Women’s Basketball 0
Football 0
Soccer 0
