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Bill Sylvester was champion football coach, longtime athletic director at Butler

INDIANAPOLIS – Athlete, coach, administrator, Marine.

All apply to Bill Sylvester. More than any of those, this:

Butler Bulldog.

Butler University announced that Sylvester, who was connected to Bulldog athletics for decades, died Wednesday. He was 93.

When the NCAA separated into divisions in 1973, Divisions I and II offered scholarships and Division III did not. In an interview, Sylvester once told IndyStar the Butler president, Alexander E. Jones, considered taking the Bulldogs into Division III.

Such a change in athletics would have forever changed the university.

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