This is the second in a series of articles profiling the 2023 inductees into the Butler Area School District Athletic Hall of Fame

By John Enrietto

Eagle Sports Editor

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Basketball was a natural for Kim Nowakowski Tarovisky — from the fourth grade on.

“I was taller than the other kids in grade school,” she said. “I just gravitated toward basketball.

“I had some great coaches. They helped develop my game. After a while, I felt like I could be pretty good at this.”

She turned out to be great at it.

Nowakowski went on to score 1,137 points for Butler Area High School and 1,240 at California (Pa.) University, along with collecting hundreds of rebounds at both stops.

That production is landing her in the Butler Area School District Athletic Hall of Fame. The 2003 Butler graduate will be inducted along with Golden Tornado track and field coach John Williams and swimming great Peter Staruch during a ceremony in the high school cafeteria at 6 p.m. Dec. 22.

The trio will also be recognized at halftime of the Slippery Rock-Butler boys basketball game that night in the Tornado gym.

“I’m thrilled about this,” Nowakowski said of her induction. “Butler has been and continues to be a big part of my life. That’s where it all started for me.”

Nowakowski grabbed 620 rebounds to go with her 1,137 points for Butler. She averaged 16 points and seven rebounds per game her senior year, blocking 49 shots, and helped the Tornado to a 22-6 record and berth in the PIAA quarterfinals.

She was ranked among the top 50 centers in the country during her senior season.

“That was an accomplishment I’m particularly proud of,” Nowakowski said. “I remember Coach (Dorothea) Epps coaching me all the way up, from elementary school, through middle school and in high school.

“I remember rarely playing at all my freshman year at Butler. We had so many good players ... I don’t even think I scored a point. Then I started as a sophomore.”

Current Shady Side Academy girls basketball coach Jonna Burke was Nowakowski’s head coach at Butler. The two continue to keep in contact.

Nowakowski originally accepted a full scholarship to Bowling Green State University in Ohio. She red-shirted there as a freshman before deciding to transfer.

“I was homesick and I wanted to go to a school close enough that my parents could see me play,” she said. “If I transferred to another D-1 school, I would have had to sit out another year.

“California had one of the top Division II women’s basketball teams in the country. I figured, why not just go there?”

A three-year starter for the Vulcans, Nowakowski became a two-time first-team All-PSAC player. She helped the team win a par of conference titles and she was named PSAC Tournament MVP in 2006.

Nowakowski continues to be among the Vulcans’ top 10 all-time in career rebounds and free throws made.

“When I played in high school, we didn’t do much weight room work or anything,” Nowakowski said. “In college, I became physically stronger and my basketball IQ improved as well.

“I became a much smarter player.”

Nowakowski and her husband, Justin Tarovisky, live in Morgantown, W.Va..They have two children — daughter Ava, 9, and son Ethan, 8. Both play basketball.

Working as a paralegal for WVU Medicine, Nowakowski also coaches her daughter’s fourth-grade team.

“It is so much fun,” she said. “Ava is my point guard now, but I imagine she’s going to be tall. My husband is 6-foot-5.

“I’m teaching her post moves inside. That’s something that’s becoming lost in basketball. I want to give that back. I enjoy passing down my knowledge that way,”

Nowakowski still plays in 3-on-3 recreational leagues and in a 5-on-5 league. One of her teams won the title this year.

“I can still play,” she said, laughing. “It’s how I feel a day or two after the game that reminds me how old I am.”