BUTLER TWP — Cooper Baxter has his priorities in order.

The Butler sophomore's favorite sport?

“Whatever sport is in season,” he said. “I'll never put working on a sport that's out of season over one that's in season.”

And school is in season all the time.

“School will always be there,” Baxter said. “Sports are secondary and come after academics.

“How well you do in school will affect your life for the next 40 years. You have to pay prime attention to that.”

The 6-foot-1, 180-pound Baxter puts plenty of time into everything he does — and he does plenty.

“Cooper handles himself so well, for a person of any age,” Golden Tornado football coach Eric Christy said. “His personality is infectious. You just love to be around the kid.”

Baxter is more than a three-sport athlete at Butler. He is a three-sport standout, playing football in the fall, wrestling in the winter and playing baseball in the spring and summer.

He had never played quarterback before last fall, yet stepped in as Butler's starter and rushed for 761 yards and seven touchdowns, threw for 677 yards and four TDs for a winless team.

Baxter had been a running back, fullback or wide receiver in years past. He's been playing football for nine years, has been wrestling and playing baseball for 12.

“I was open to it,” Baxter said of the football coaches approaching him with the idea of going behind center. “If they felt that gave us the best chance to win, I was gonna do it.”

Baxter has been doing a lot of winning on his own in wrestling. He is 63-18 with 24 pins, including 33-8 his sophomore season, shuffling between 170 and 182 pounds.

His career winning percentage of 77.7 ranks seventh on Butler's all-time list.

“That percentage is probably going to go up over the next two years,” Tornado wrestling coach Scott Stoner said. “Cooper is an amazing kid. He puts in time with sports simultaneously.

“He'll do a winter baseball practice, then come to wrestling, he'll come to wrestling practice after football, whatever he needs to do. And he ranks high in his class academically.”

Baxter is carrying a 4.05 grade point average, ranking fifth in his sophomore class of 515.

Cole Baxter, Butler's all-time wrestling victory and winning percentage leader at 160-17 (90 percent), is Cooper's cousin.

“When I was young, my dad went to all of Cole's matches,” Baxter said. “He told me I was going to get into wrestling. I was 4 years old, so I listened to him.

“I want to live up to the legacy my cousins Cole and Caleb (now wrestling at Waynesburg University) established before me. We have a great room. Alex Evanoff, Trevor Gallo, Coach (Fred) Powell, Coach Stoner, all of those guys have helped me.”

Midway through the 2019 high school baseball season, Baxter took over as Butler's starting varsity shortstop as a freshman. He hit over .300 that season.

He was leading off and playing shorstop during scrimmages before the spring sports season was shut down. Baxter plays summer baseball for the Pittsburgh Spikes AAU team.

Butler baseball coach Josh Forbes said Baxter was “in the mix” for the shortstop job this year, though no starting roles had been determined yet.

“It's a tribute to his work ethic that he's able to excel in three sports,” Forbes said. “Open gyms are designed for kids to voluntarily come and get some work in.

“It says a lot for a kid to show the commitment to attend those open gyms while he's competing in another sport at the time.”

Like everyone else, Baxter is hoping spring sports resume at some point.

“It's tough, but I'm still doing what I can to stay in shape,” he said. “I'm throwing every day, getting in a batting cage twice a week.

“I'll be ready to play whenever we're able to play.”

So it goes with Cooper Baxter. End one season, get on with the next.

“We encourage that,” Christy said. “Scott (Stoner) and I talk all the time about how football and wrestling play off each other.

“I can see the toughness Cooper gained through wrestling coming into play on the football field. And his athleticism in football comes to play in wrestling. We're encouraging a lot of our kids to do both sports.”

Multiple sports are the way to go for Baxter.

“When it comes to college, I'll probably have to choose one,” he said. “But I'm not worried about that now. I'm enjoying each sport as it comes and am working to improve in all olf them.

“From there, let the chips fall where they may.”