BUTLERTWP— Butler County Community College never intended to have an athletic program beyond intramurals.

"That was the original idea,"said retired BC3 athletic director Chuck Dunaway said. "We formed an intramural basketball team first because that's the sport that's easiest to get started."

The Community College of Beaver County and CCAC-Boyce also started basketball teams that same 1967-68 school year. Eventually, the teams wanted to play each other.

"We played four games in the winter of 1968, two against both of those teams,"Dunaway said.

BC3 lost to CCBC 126-79 on Feb. 15, 1968, and an intercollegiate athletic program was born.

Since then, tennis, racquetball and cross country programs have come and gone. Men's and women's basketball, baseball, women's softball, golf and women's volleyball are offered today by the college.

Dunaway, who served as athletic director at BC3 for 32 years, was in on the formation of the Western Pennsylvania Collegiate Conference and Pennsylvania Collegiate Athletic Association. Both continue to govern junior college athletics across the state today.

"I've been president of it, treasurer, you name it,"Dunaway said. "They were needed. Countless kids have benefited from them, and that's what I'm most proud of.

"Some kids mature during their first year or two out of high school. We've given numerous kids a second chance, sent them on to the next level."

While many former Pioneers advanced to NCAADivision IIand IIIprograms, Tom McConnell became the lone BC3 basketball alumnus to go on to play Division I ball when he moved on to Davidson. Three former BC3 baseball players went on to North Carolina State.

Former BC3 basketball coach Tom Beckett is the athletic director at Yale University. Former Pioneers basketball coach Bob Barlett eventually coached at Slippery Rock University. Former BC3 baseball coach John Stuper, who pitched in the World Series for the St. Louis Cardinals, is the baseball coach at Yale.

The Pioneers have captured 25 WPCCchampionships and 11 PCAAtitles in the sports they currently offer.

"Given our situation, we've done pretty well for ourselves,"golf coach Bill Miller said. "Our student body is smaller than most of the schools we play and we don't offer scholarships.

"We've won state championships in basketball, beating a school from Philadelphia five or six times bigger than us."

Athletic director Rob Snyder said the toughest thing to overcome in junior college athletics is coaching turnover.

"We go through a lot of them,"Snyder said. "Finding coaches to run all these sports year to year is hard at times. Guys move on to other jobs or they get burned out.

"We've managed to stay competitive in every sport we offer. Most schools in our league may be really good in one sport, but that's it."

Since beginning its athletic program, BC3 has built a field house in 1976 for basketball and volleyball. and constructed a new baseball field.

Dunaway said the Pioneers became the school's nickname because BC3 was the first junior college formed on the western side of the state. Before the field house was built, the basketball team played its home games wherever it could find an open court.

"I used to call around to the high schools in Butler County to find who had a gym available,"Dunaway said. "We played home games at Butler, Knoch, Mars, Karns City, the Butler Cubs Hall or YMCA."

The biggest name ever to play at the BC3 Fieldhouse was Ben Wallace. A fixture for the recent Detroit Pistons NBAchampionship teams, Wallace played on the Pioneers' floor as a member of the Cuyahoga (Ohio) Community College squad.

"We triple-teamed him and still couldn't stop him,"Dunaway said, laughing.

Dunaway coached men's and women's basketball, cross country, tennis and golf at one time or another during his tenure at the college.

Painting the gym, liming the baseball field, driving the bus, serving as security at home sporting events were all part of his job description.

"There will never be another athletic director like him in sports anywhere,"said former Pioneers men's basketball coach Dick Hartung. "He did it all. The key component to Butler County Community College athletics was Chuck Dunaway.

"The program would not have existed without him."

Dunaway used to open the field house at 7:30 a.m. so a group of workers from Armco could shower there after getting off the overnight shift, then report to 8 a.m. class.

For basketball road trips, he drove one of the vans, the coach drove the other.

"Athletic directors at bigger schools do administrative work,"Dunaway said. "I was always closer to the teams and got to know the kids. The job is much more personal at this level."

Snyder coached the only BC3 team to place in a national tournament. His 2002 volleyball squad finished fifth at the National Junior College Athletic Association Championships.

Team members were Erin Johnson, Angie Mohr, Kelli Wurmb, Megan Smith, Renee Rock, Heather Graham, Sara Fredley and Nicole Sebastian.

Other tidbits of BC3 athletics history include:

• Kathy Wood, still employed at the college, led the softball program to its lone state title in 1990.

• The college has had three mascots:Snoopy, a bumble-bee known as the Killer Bee, and a pioneer wearing a coonskin cap.

• Kathy Clay, member of the 1981 volleyball state title team, died of cancer in October 1982. Her parents established a scholarship fund in her name and the volleyball squad repeated as state champion.

• Before the WPCCwas formed, the Pioneers competed in the Skyline Athletic Conference, winning its first league title in golf in 1973.

• William Grofft, cross country; Tracy Pease, tennis singles; and Shelly West and Josanne Neiswenter, (tennis doubles, won individual state titles for the Pioneers.

• The baseball team defeated the visiting Russian national team, 9-3, in a 1991 game at Pullman Park.

• Bryant Lewandowski, who had 1,311 points, is the only BC3 basketball player to ever score 1,000 points at the school.