BUTLER TWP — For Deer Lakes High School varsity boys basketball, the future is now.

And now, Butler graduate Jon McKay is in charge of the show.

McKay, 33, a social studies teacher at Butler High School, was hired to replace former Butler coach Joe Lewandowski as the Lancers’ hoop mentor during a Deer Lakes school board meeting Monday night.

Lewandowski resigned from the position in mid September — finishing 4-18 in his only season at Deer Lakes — to care for his ill mother.

“Joe is all about basketball,” McKay said. “The only thing he cares about more is his family. This was a no-brainer for him.”

Lewandowski coached USA 3-on-3 basketball this summer. McKay was an assistant on his staff for five years at Butler and last year at Deer Lakes.

“I’ve been hanging around with Joe for about 10 years now and I learned new things about the game from him all the time,” McKay said. “I was very fortunate to have coached under him.”

McKay graduated from Butler in 1998 and was teammates with Golden Tornado greats Troy Nunes, Steve Adams, Aaron Epps and Ralph Deabrunzzo. George Abraham was his high school coach, Tony Grenek his collegiate coach at Butler County Community College.

McKay was given the Deer Lakes job by a 5-0 school board vote. A number of Deer Lakes basketball players attended the Monday school board meeting in support of McKay.

“I’m somewhat surprised I got this, but I’m excited about it,” McKay said. “We have a number of seniors on this team and we believe we can win right now.”

Other than a 12-8 record in 2009-10 — including 5-7 in conference — Deer Lakes has not been to the WPIAL playoffs in 10 years and is 13-75 in section play over seven seasons.

But the Lancers are dropping from Class AAA to AA this year and will be in a section with Summit Academy, Burrell, Apollo-Ridge, Ford City and West Shamokin.

“We were the smallest team in Triple-A last year and were in the same league as Hampton, Mars, Highlands and Knoch,” McKay said. “This year, we’ll be up against more schools at our level.”

Ryan Stanko was a standout senior scorer on that 2009-10 Deer Lakes team and he is now playing at Allegheny College. This year’s team will have a solid senior scorer of its own in Tim Jaczesko, who averaged 15 points per game as a sophomore.

Jaczesko missed last season with a broken leg.

“He’s back, he’s healthy and he’s a leader of this team,” McKay said. “The other kids rally around him and I’ll be counting on his leadership ability.”

McKay is planning no radical changes in the program, saying he’s merely carrying through what Lewandowski started.

Conlan Walsh, a Butler junior high coach the past three years, will be McKay’s varsity assistant.

“We started to get some pretty good crowds last year and the numbers are up all through the system,” McKay said. “We had to make cuts at the seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade levels last year.

“I’m the third head coach in as many years at Deer Lakes. These kids need continuity and I hope to provide that. I’m planning on being here for a while.”