BUTLER TWP — Talk about your late bloomers.

Butler graduate Ethan Trettel’s football career appeared to be over before it started — in fourth grade.

“I was going to play Midget football when I was going into fourth grade,” said Trettel, who graduated this spring. “I wound up needing hernia surgery and missed that whole season.

“I just never went back to it.”

That was until his junior year in high school. The 5-foot-8, 140-pound Trettel decided to go out for the Golden Tornado football team and played junior varsity all season as a wide receiver-defensive back.

“Football has always been my favorite sport to watch on TV,” he said. “My father (Jason Trettel) played for Slippery Rock High School and Edinboro University, also at wide receiver. My dad, brother and I played football in the backyard all the time.

“My junior year ... I figured if I was ever gonna play in high school, it was now or never.”

He caught one pass for no yards in varsity football his junior season. Trettel’s senior season arrived and he found himself a central figure of Butler’s passing attack. Trettel caught 25 passes for 512 yards and four touchdowns — averaging a team-leading 20.5 yards per catch — despite missing the final three games of the season with a fractured fibula.

He started every game at cornerback his senior year at Butler as well.

“We weren’t sure what we were going to have in him,” Butler coach Eric Christy admitted. “I remember Ethan catching a pass against Westinghouse and outrunning their defensive backs for a touchdown — and that team had a lot of speed.

“I looked at one of our assistant coaches and said, ‘we have a pretty good player here.’”

Butler didn’t have Trettel late in the season, including the District 10 6A championship game loss to McDowell in Erie.

A baseball player since he was 3 years old, Trettel watched his football teammates play from the sidelines in those final games.

“I missed our Senior Night, the game we clinched a playoff berth and our playoff game,” Trettel said. “That was painful. I felt helpless, just standing there, unable to contribute. That’s when I realized I needed to play more football.”

After getting a few looks from Division III and smaller Division II schools, Trettel decided to attend Slippery Rock University to major in Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering. He carried a 3.7 grade point average in high school.

Looking to walk on at The Rock this summer, Trettel was denied that opportunity until next spring.

“We like him. He looks like a good slot guy,” SRU coach Shawn Lutz said of Trettel as a receiver. “Our roster is just full this season. We had no room for him. But we’re giving him the walk-on opportunity next spring.”

The Rock became particularly interested following Trettel’s performance in the recent District 10 North-South All-Star Game at Allegheny College. While his South team was on the losing end of a 61-40 score, Trettel caught six passes for 118 yards and a touchdown. One of his catches went for 40 yards on a fade route during a fourth-down play (in lieu of an onside kick) to keep possession.

Lutz is good friends with Grove City High School coach Sam Mowrey, who coached in that all-star game.

“Sam was impressed with the kid and so am I,” Lutz said. “He (Trettel) got a late start in football, but so did (fellow Butler graduate) Nick Stazer and look at him now.”

Stazer played only his senior season at Butler and is now a starting offensive lineman for SRU.

“I enjoyed playing in that game, making new friends and experiencing different coaches,” Trettel said. “It just made me want to play in college even more. I’m confident I can make their (SRU) roster and work my way in.

“I feel like I can play on the same level as those guys.”

Christy is happy Trettel is continuing to pursue the game.

“He’s a little small, that’s the big thing against him,” the Butler coach said. “But Ethan is an explosive player. He’s confident in his abilities. I’m looking forward to seeing what he can do.”