After playing four years at Holy Cross, Latrobe native Austin Butler has decided to take his talents to Charlotte to play his last remaining season of college basketball.
At Holy Cross, Butler averaged 12.1 points and 5.2 rebounds per game over all four seasons. However, this season, he put up career highs in both categories, putting up 16.1 points and 8.7 rebounds per game, earning him Second Team All-Patriot League honors.
Leaving Holy Cross was no easy task for the former Latrobe star, as he had battled through years of injury and COVID implications throughout his time there and still had four solid years with the Crusaders.
“Making this decision was hard,” Butler told Pittsburgh Sports now a few weeks ago. “One thing we knew as I sat down with the coaching staff before the season and knew that COVID was going to give us an extra year of eligibility, we had a brief conversation about academics and with Holy Cross not being a grad school, it probably wouldn’t be a realistic option for me to stay. Since I already had a major and a minor, we knew that once the season ended that this was going to be the next step. While I am excited for the next chapter, this is hard for me because of everything that Holy Cross has done for me and the relationships that I have with my teammates and coaches.”
Charlotte finished this season 9-16, going 5-11 in Conference USA play, good for fifth place in the East division. The 49ers are coached by Ron Sanchez, who just finished up his third season at the helm.
In Butler, Charlotte will be getting a very good scorer with four years of experience of over 100 games played and 99 games started. This season, he shot career bests in both field goal percentage and 3-point field goal percentage, shooting 51% and 46%, respectively.
