[no subject]

Vaughn
year       team   GM's   MPG     FG%     FT%    3pt%    RPG    APG    SPG
PPG
01-02   <A HREF="http://hawks.realgm.com/";>ATL</A>   82       22.6  47.0
82.5    44.4    2.0    4.3    0.8  6.6

Anderson
year       team   GM's   MPG     FG%     FT%    3pt%    RPG    APG    SPG
PPG
01-02     BOS     76      32        43.6      74.2     27.3     3.6      5.3
    1.86     9.6

<A HREF="http://www.kusports.com/news/kusp_m_basketballf/story/97346";>Lawrence
Journal World</A>


Vaughn passes test

Guard survived 0-for-22 run to open season

By >Gary Bedore</A>, Assistant Sports Editor

Tuesday, June 25, 2002

He was ridiculed on ESPN's SportsCenter and mocked by former NBA
great-turned-analyst Charles Barkley on TNT.


You better believe Atlanta Hawks point guard Jacque Vaughn took a lot of
grief for missing his first 22 shots during four games to open the 2001-02
season.

"I kind of really got to know who my friends were a little bit," the
6-foot-1, 27-year-old former Kansas University player said Monday. "Some of
my friends gave me a call and harassed me a little bit. They told me to watch
SportsCenter and see what they were saying about me."

Not all the messages left during that time were comical.

"At that time, when I was struggling, coach Williams left a message on my
voice mail saying if anybody could get out of it he knew I could," Vaughn
said of his former coach, Roy Williams, whose camp Vaughn was the guest
speaker for Monday at Horejsi Center.

"It actually was a great test for me mentally. After four games I said to
myself, 'Well, it's happened. There's nothing I can do about the past.'

"I knew I had worked too hard in the offseason and practiced too many shots,
shots I had made before. I said, 'I'm going to forget about it and keep
pressing on.'"


Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo

Atlanta's Jacque Vaughn, a former Kansas University standout, speaks to
campers at KU coach Roy Williams' basketball camp. Vaughn was telling the
young players not to be afraid to fail Monday at Horejsi Center.

Vaughn later was able to laugh about his early struggles.

He finished the season a 47-percent shooter. Just four other NBA point guards
shot better than Vaughn, who has completed his one-year deal in Atlanta and
starting July 1 will be free to sign with any team.

"I always tell people that since I had switched teams I just wanted everybody
in Kansas to know that I was still doing OK and was just on a new team. It
was my way of getting on TV a little bit," Vaughn said with a laugh.

Interestingly, Vaughn was praised on SportsCenter and a postgame guest on TNT
just weeks after his 22-shot skid. His 20-footer at the buzzer in early
December beat Philadelphia by two points.

"When I got home after the game, I put in the tape to watch that shot,"
Vaughn said. "I did not want to see my shooting form or anything like that. I
wanted to see if on the last possession, 'Did I want the ball?'

"I did call for the ball and wanted the shot, even after opening the season
0-for-22. I was not afraid to fail."

He did not fail, finishing the season with career best marks in starts (16),
points per game (6.6), assists per game (4.3), field goal percentage and free
throw percentage (82.5).

He isn't discounting trying to improve on those numbers in Atlanta next
season.

"I had a great time in Atlanta. It's not to say I'm not going to be back
there, that is possible. I just really honestly don't know," Vaughn said.
"Teams can't talk to me or my agent until July 1."

Vaughn b he's purchased a home in Lawrence and slated to be married later
this summer b admits he'd like his next stop to be a permanent one.

"It's getting to be a little tougher. I have to move more furniture, more
furniture I've collected over the year," Vaughn said. "It makes it more
difficult, harder when you are talking about having a family. I want to get
settled and get in a place where they (future children) can grow up. When I'm
by myself it's easier. Getting a family it's different."

The Californian loves Lawrence so much he considers it home.

"It feels good to wake up and have breakfast, work out and go to sleep in the
same place three or four months in the offseason rather than going up an
elevator to a different hotel room," Vaughn said. "I do consider this home
now."

He hopes Lawrence will be known as the home of a starting NBA point guard.
He's started just 16 of 306 career games.

"That is always the goal, to be starting," Vaughn said. "I won't relinquish
that goal until it happens. I want to contribute and I want to win. I'm
looking for that combination."

His college coach believes Vaughn is capable of starting and remains a big
fan of the academic All-American.

"I tell people after he retires he could be governor of California or
Kansas," Williams said. "He's that kind of youngster. He is one of the most
disciplined young men I've coached. He's the best I've ever had in being a
coach on the floor. The best I've had in being concerned with how his
teammates were doing. He's truly one of the great players to play at Kansas."

And one of the greatest players to bounce back from an 0-for-22 beginning.

"Of all the youngsters I've dealt with in life who could handle adversity,
handle it and be tough enough in the next game to want to take the shot, that
player would be Jacque Vaughn," Williams said. "I left him a message on his
answering machine last season saying, 'I know you can handle it.' I told
reporters he could handle it and would handle it. He ends up the season in
the top five of all point guards shooting.

"It doesn't surprise me. Nothing that young man does would surprise me."