Lights ink standout Washington post player

With a ton of seniors leaving the two-time defending Frontier Conference champion MSU-Northern men's basketball program, Lights' head coach Shawn Huse has begun the process of restocking his squad for the 2012-2013 season.

On Monday night, Huse announced the signing of 6-5 forward Jesse Vaughan to an NAIA letter of intent. Vaughan is trans

ferring to Northern from Shoreline Community College in Seattle, Wash. He is originally from Spokane, Wash.

Vaughan, who will have three years of eligibility at Northern, led Shoreline in scoring at 26.1 ppg and rebounding at 8.1 per game. He also averaged 2.8 assists and three steals per outing as a sophomore. In the Pierce College Thanksgiving Tournament this past November, Vaughan scored 48 points in one game. As a freshman at Shoreline, he also led the team in scoring at 16.2 points per game and grabbed six rebounds per outing.

Vaughan is a two-time all NWAACC performer and a runner up for NWAACC Player of the Year. Also, as a freshman, Vaughn led his team to the NWAACC Northern Region championship.

"We are extremely excited Jesse chose to be a Light," Huse said. "This is a huge piece to the puzzle for us staying highly competitive in the future. He is arguably one of the best all-around basketball players in the Washington area over the past several years. He has the ability to make plays on both ends of the court and always seems to have a hand in everything positive that happens for his team. With our returners, we feel he will fit nicely into our program, at a forward spot for us in the future.

"I'm very excited to give my best effort at a balanced attack and help my team in any way possible to make sure we continue to not only make the tourney (NAIA National Tournament), but do some serious damage once we get there," Vaughan added.

As a senior at Rogers High School in Spokane, Vaughan was a First Team All GSL performer, and the leading scorer in the conference. He led Rogers to the state tournament for the first time in 35 years.

Vaughan pans on studying community leadership and HPE while at Northern.