Chris Murray

RGJ

The Wolf Pack football team is losing a little juice.

Andy Vaughn, the team's director of football and recruiting operations, and the man affectionately known by his nickname "Juice" around Wolf Pack Park, has accepted the same job at Nebraska.

For most people, going from Nevada to Nebraska, one of the storied programs in college football, would have been an easy decision. For Vaughn, whose wife grew up in Tahoe and who has lived in Reno for six years over two stints, it did take some soul-searching before he decided to head to Lincoln.

"It was tougher for me than it would have been for most people in our profession," Vaughn said via phone Tuesday. "Most people would have said, 'This is an obvious no-brainer. It's time to go.' My wife and I have been married for 10 years next summer and in the two stints we've lived here, the majority of our married life has been spent in Reno. It's a special place for us. We have more roots, so it was tougher, but when we boiled it down, this was a long-time goal. It made too much sense to turn down."

Vaughn, who came to Nevada in 2012 and helped build the program's digital recruiting database while serving as the team's unsung hero during on-campus recruiting visits, was one of four Wolf Pack football staffers retained by coach Brian Polian when Polian took over the program prior to the 2013 season.

Vaughn was hired by Chris Ault and tasked with building Nevada's recruiting infrastructure from scratch. The Wolf Pack didn't have the position until 2011 and was far behind before Vaughn got on campus.

"When I got here, the program was just really behind with the off-the-field staff," said Vaughn, whose job included a role in compliance, day-to-day administration, budgeting and increasing media exposure and recognition. "Coach Ault did a great job with such little staff and little resources. They were really 10-20 years behind in the nuances with how recruiting has grown with the technology out there nowadays."

Vaughn, who also was tasked with setting up a recruit's official visit, from meals to lodging to campus tours, was one of the most knowledge people on campus about Nevada's history. After getting the job at Nevada, he went on as many campus tours as possible to know every detail about the school and city.

Vaughn, one of the fast-risers in the nation at his position, also has worked at Clemson and Middle Tennessee State. A relationship he created at Middle Tennessee State helped land him the Nebraska job, as an old acquaintance from Tennessee had a link to Mike Riley, who left Oregon State for Nebraska this offseason. Vaughn will start at Nebraska next week after trying up some loose ends at Nevada.

"I want to get these guys ready to go when recruiting starts back up," Vaughn said of the Wolf Pack staff. "I think the guys are going to do a fantastic job with this class, putting it all together and finishing everything up."

Vaughn is the first departure from the Wolf Pack's staff this offseason. After Nevada's loss to Louisiana in the New Orleans Bowl, Polian said he didn't expect any changes to his staff, but Nevada has regularly been raided in the offseason. Last year, the program lost defensive coordinator Scottie Hazelton (to the NFL) and tight ends coach James Spady (to Alabama A&M, where he became the head coach).

While it was bittersweet for 33-year-old Vaughn to leave Nevada, he's accomplishing something he set out to achieve years ago.

"Ten years ago I was in grad school," Vaughn said. "That was one thing I always said to myself, 'That within 10 years I'd like to be a big, Power 5 school.' It's kind of an amazing deal. I told my wife that it hasn't really hit me yet. It probably won't until I walk into the office for the first day."