Kevin Butler and his wife, Cathy, were a match made in sports heaven. Well, perhaps a match made in DeKalb County.
Butler went to Redan High and Cathy went to Lakeside when the Vikings were a big academic and athletic power in the 1970s. They met at the University of Georgia with Kevin on the football team and Cathy on the cheer squad.
They were engaged during Butler’s senior season, but had to push the wedding back after he was drafted by the Bears.
“I went up to minicamp, and the Bears had been in the conference championship game the year before,’’ he said. “They were determined to get to the Super Bowl and it was all coming from Mike Singletary and Walter Payton and others and they were screaming and yelling that if you weren’t going to make a commitment to this team then you were not going to be on this team.’’
So Kevin called Cathy in Atlanta and said, “We got to change the wedding and the first thing she said to me was, ‘Did I meet somebody?’ So we decided to change it to two weeks after the Super Bowl.’’
The Bears went to Super Bowl XX, beating the New England Patriots 46-10 and a few weeks later, Kevin and Cathy were married at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church on Briarcliff Road in, yes, DeKalb County.
“That’s the same church that Bears running back Brian Piccolo was married in,’’ Butler said.
Piccolo, a running back for the Bears, was best friends with the great Gale Sayers and died of cancer in 1970. His story was captured in the popular movie “Brian’s Song.’’
Piccolo married a woman (Joy) from Atlanta and said Butler, who now lives in Duluth, “It’s interesting how all these things came together. After I played football in Chicago, I lived there for a while. That is what you do when you are a Bear. But I came back home.’’
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