Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Basketball Coach Search Begins

Knowing something is going to happen doesn't make dealing with it any easier when it does.

This is the case with Prescott Wolverette Coach Cecily Butler, who has tendered her resignation as the mentor for the basketball teams. The resignation was accepted by the Prescott School Board in a special meeting Friday, June 6.

Butler has accepted a job with the Genoa School District, where she will be turning in her maroon and white for the green and gold of the Lady Dragons.

She will be working to build the kind of tradition at Genoa there is in Prescott. Following Coach Paul Noesser, Butler coached at PHS for three years and posted a winning record every season.

The Wolverettes were 14-13 in her inaugural season, but went 25-7 in the second year and 28-6 this past campaign. In three years, the overall record for the Wolverettes was 67-26. This includes winning the district tournament twice, two consecutive trips to the state tournament, a regional title, bringing back the crown for the final Murfreesboro tourney and the prestigious Southwest Arkansas Invitational Tournament at Saratoga.

Her junior girls teams were 10-6 their first year and posted identical 17-3 marks the next two seasons for a 44-12 record in three years.

Butler had turned down other potential job offers to remain at Prescott, but found the Genoa offer the one she couldn't refuse.

This was because it will be easier for her husband, Jeff, to find a job where he can be home with the family more. Currently, he is employed with Universal Ensco, a oil and gas pipeline survey company out of Houston, Texas. He is working at this time in Augusta, Maine.

"I had to think about my family," Butler said. "We're not statistics and there's no need to live like one. We don't like being separated. It's important for our children to have their father and I need my husband."

She said it will be easier for Jeff to find suitable employment in the Genoa region.

However, leaving Prescott and the teams is not easy for Butler. "Prescott grows on you," she said. "The people here are good, the school has been good to me and these kids are the best. I'll miss the teachers.

"But, when it's time for me to retire, the teachers will be gone, the students will have lives of their own and I'll still have my husband and children."

Butler told the Wolverettes her decision to take the Genoa job Tuesday, June 3, after learning she got the position the day before. The team took the news hard, but understood the reasons for her leaving.

"I knew this time was going to come," she said, "but that doesn't make it any easier. It wasn't easy telling the team."

Several of the girls cried when they heard the news, as did Butler while telling them. These girls, she said, were like part of her family.

"The hard part's over," Butler said, "and I think they're all right. This is the greatest bunch there could be."

The students aren't the only ones Butler will miss at Prescott. She said there have been many others who have made her job much easier by volunteering their time and energy to help make the program successful.

"I'll miss them," she said, "all those who stood behind me and supported me. They always offered their total support and this makes it hard to leave."

Whoever the district hires to replace Butler will be on the receiving end of three of the best guards in the state, and a winning tradition.

Butler said these girls know what it takes to win and have the work ethic to get the job done.

"Whoever comes in," she said, "will have a good bunch."

The 1997-98 Wolverettes, Butler said, will have a good core with Jessica Hildebrand, Stacy Stockton and Traci Graham, all excellent and proven players.

"The girls handled it better than expected," she said of her leaving. "They were mature about it. I got a lot of congratulations, and they all said there were no ill feelings."

The younger players, however, took the news hard. Butler sympathized because her coach left when she was in the seventh grade. "I know what they're going through, but they have time to change and relearn. The older girls know what to do. The future here is bright."

According to Butler, the eighth graders next year will be more athletic than the seniors who graduated this past season.

The Wolverettes, she said, are smart and will field a good team. "They have a good attitude. It makes me sick (to leave them), but it's something I have to do."

Butler said she could cry about what she's losing in a team, or stayed and possibly grown stagnant, wondering what might have been.

"I'm leaving the best job in the state," she said. "People ought to be lined up to get it."

She praised the Wolverette and Cubette players saying they lived at the gym, working on their game. "They didn't have superior talent," Butler said of her players, "but they had superior heart, drive, desire and attitude. That's what makes a winner.

"They worked hard and these kids believed this is their key. They don't mind working."

The new Wolverette and Cubette leader will be coming into a well organized situation, as everything has been inventoried and put in its proper place.

Next season's Wolverettes will be donning new uniforms and have 15 brand new basketballs to dazzle those unfortunates wearing the wrong colors with.

"These kids are a special breed," Butler said of her charges. "It's not by chance. They have good parents, teachers and community."

Still, leaving the known and comfortable for the unknown is hard. While cleaning out her office, Butler cried. "This was part of my life," she said, choked with emotion. "Every day, being here, starting at 7, 7:15 or 7:30 a.m. and these girls being ready to go."

But everything wasn't always this smooth with Butler and the Wolverettes. While doing her student teaching at PHS, the girls on the team thought she was mean and threatened to quit when they learned she had been hired to replace Noesser.

"I was scared following a legend. He was a great teacher of life skills and helping the kids," she said. "I realized the importance of this to the program -- teaching life skills; work ethic; honesty and how to get along in the world. Then you coach the game.

"He still helps," she said of Noesser. "He's been my mentor. It's been fun and fulfilling, but it seems so short and was a heck of a way to start a career.

"Prescott is a wonderful place, a great school with great athletes."

When asked about the most memorable times as a coach, she said the double overtime win against Star City in the regional finals stands out the most.

"That," she said, "had nothing to do with coaching, but who wanted to win the most.

Other memories included the back-to-back trips to the state tournament.

However, what Butler said she would remember most is the girls always coming in to practice being ready t