BUTLER TWP — Laying a foundation is important to Mark Maier.

He’s still doing it.

The 1988 Butler graduate is among the all-time leading basketball scorers for the Golden Tornado and Indiana (Pa.) University.

“We reached the WPIAL playoffs in my senior year at Butler,” he recalled. “We finished 19-8 and that was the team’s first playoff berth in a few years.

“I like to think our team that year laid the foundation for the 1991 team that won the WPIAL championship.”

That 19-win season was the first in Butler boys basketball history.

Maier went on to IUP, played 108 games, won 54 and lost 54.

“Two years after I graduated, they (IUP) were No. 1 in the country and had a 25-game winning streak,” he said. “Again, I believe my last team there got that started.”

For his exploits on the basketball court, Maier is one of six inductees into the Butler Area School District Athletic Hall of Fame this year. He will join fellow inductees Shawn Bellis, Annie Lowry, Troy Mohney, Lyneil Mitchell and Mark Farabee at a 5 p.m. ceremony Sept. 5 in the high school cafeteria.

The inductees will be presented on the field prior to Butler’s home football opener against Baldwin that night.

In the meantime, Maier, who lives in Butler, is still laying a foundation, helping to coach his daughters’ youth basketball and softball teams. Makenna is entering fifth grade while Avery is beginning second grade.

“It’s the best of both worlds,” he said. “I love coaching kids and I get to spend time with my girls. I’m excited for them because I’ve learned things in sports that have stayed with me my whole life and they will learn those same things.

“Working as a team, facing adversity ... Sports prepare you for all of that.”

Maier became the first Butler boys basketball player to score more than 1,000 points. He finished with 1,216, including a career-high 45 against Shaler, and was first team all-section three years in a row.

He averaged 21.4 points per game his senior year and was named team MVP as a junior and senior. Maier sank a buzzer-beating shot to knock off Mt. Lebanon in the first round of the 1988 playoffs.

Maier scored more than 1,000 points at IUP as well, sinking 141 3-pointers 78.1 percent of his free throws. He ranks among IUP’s all-time top 10 in both categories.

“I believe I’m the only Butler boys basketball player to score 1,000 points in high school and college,” Maier said. “I’m pretty proud of that.”

Inducted into the Butler County Sports Hall of Fame in 2007, Maier ran the Cleveland Marathon three times and the Erie Marathon once from 2004 through 2007.

“I remember saying I was going to run a marathon every year until I was 50,” he said. “I wound up stopping at four. It’s amazing how once you have kids, their lives become your life. But that’s the way it should be.

“Training for a marathon is preparing for a goal. That’s another thing becoming an athlete does for you. It puts you in the mind-set of setting a goal and doing what it takes to attain them.”

Maier said he hopes to continue coaching his daughters’ teams as long as they stay in sports.

“Watching how kids learn and get better, it’s enjoyable,” he said. “I figure that as long as I’m coaching, it might as well be their teams.

“I was always a gym rat growing up, practicing in the driveway. That hoop is still up at my parents’ house and my daughters shoot around out there when we visit. That’s pretty cool to see.”