This is the first in a series of four articles profiling the 2016 inductees into the Butler Area School District Athletic Hall of Fame.BUTLER TWP — Mark Jula wasn’t here long. His imprint never left.The former Butler varsity boys basketball coach — now coaching at Ambridge — will be inducted into the Butler Area School District Athletic Hall of Fame prior to the Bridgers’ game against the Golden Tornado Dec. 16 at Butler.“That guy put Butler basketball on the map,” current Tornado coach Matt Clement said. “The program was going through a rough stretch before he got here.”Clement’s senior year at Butler was Jula’s final year here as well. Coaching here only six seasons — from 1988 through 1993 — Jula compiled a 136-34 overall record, four consecutive section titles, Butler’s lone WPIAL crown and another appearance in the finals.“We’re having a reunion of the 1991 (Butler) team that won the WPIAL championship, I’ll be coaching against Matt’s team, entering the Hall of Fame ... This should be one of the biggest nights of my life,” Jula said.“Any time I walk through the doors of that gym, the memories just flood back. Those were some of my best times in coaching.”Jula, 63, is coaching his seventh different high school program. He has compiled 526 wins and is the only coach in WPIAL history to guide four teams — Moon, Butler, North Allegheny and Ambridge — to the league’s semifinals.Jula has kept a list of names of every high school kid he’s coached. Included is the 10 hardest-working players he’s coached.“There are five Butler kids on that list, including Matt Clement,” Jula said. “Only one of them made a career out of playing basketball, but all 10 of those guys became successful.“A hard-work ethic will make you successful in anything. That’s why I keep showing that list to kids.”Keith Tower, a 6-foot-11 forward, played for Jula at Moon and went on to play at Notre Dame before backing up Shaquille O’Neal with the NBA’s Orlando Magic. Tower is on Jula’s top 10 list.And Tower was going to be a senior at Moon the year Jula took over at Butler.“I couldn’t pass up that opportunity,” Jula said. “Butler was such a big school and I knew how competitive the kids were there. You only need five or so to build a pretty good basketball team.“I knew we could put something together.”Jula described the won-loss records at Butler as “mind boggling” during his tenure there.“We were 78-10 in section play, our junior varsity was something like 110-11,” he said. “I didn’t have to instill any type of work ethic in those Butler kids because it was already there.”Clement, Frank Pugliese, Tony Grenek, Mark Maier, Shawn and Chris Bellis were only a few of the players Jula impacted during his years at Butler.“I learned discipline through him and, though I didn’t realize it at the time, how to prepare,” Clement said. “Coach Jula went way above and beyond in preparing his team for a game.“A lot of the plays I’m running at Butler now are plays we ran under his system all those years ago.”Clement added that the best compliment a coach can receive is being told his team over-achieved.“Coach Jula’s teams always did that,” he said. “If you played on his team, you did it his way. He would take what he’s got and find a way to win with it. He’s done that everywhere he’s been.”The Butler Hall of Fame will be Jula’s third HOF induction. He belongs to the Beaver County and Ambridge Halls of Fame as well and is up for induction into the Pennsylvania Coaches Hall of Fame.“I’ll never forget the support we got in Butler,” Jula said. “We’d have 1,500 people packing the gym for a home game and 500 or so would go with us on the road. The atmosphere at our games was always incredible and our players fed off it.“My own sons grew up in that Butler gym and were welcome there by everybody. I’ll never forget that. Butler will always be a very special place to me.”Clement said it will be “different” coaching against his former coach in an actual game. Their teams have scrimmaged each other in the past.“That (Dec. 16) will be his night,” Clement said. “And he will have his team prepared to do all it can to beat mine. That much I can guarantee.”