The Soccer Community Mourns the Loss of a Legend

Written by George Gansner

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Dear NISOA Family,

It’s my honor to remember our friend and colleague, Terry Vaughn, who passed away today, May 4, 2023.

Terry was an amazing person. Having first met him when we were both remotely 16-18 years old, he quickly earned high regards from State and Midwest Regional leadership in US Youth Soccer. With his tremendous fitness and passion to learn the referee side of beautiful game, Terry quickly rose the levels of the referee path. He was special – and everyone knew it.

As time went on, Terry climbed the ranks of US Soccer, was invited to Youth Regionals early on in his career and progressed to referee some of US Soccer’s most prestigious events on his way to being identified as a National Referee and potential International Referee. Through this process, Terry was also rising in the NISOA ranks, getting more and more high level, high visibility NCAA games. These games helped Terry learn how to referee at a much faster pace than what many US Soccer matches could give him at the time. And this was instrumental in his success in Major League Soccer, and ultimately as a FIFA International Referee.

Terry refereed countless NCAA and NAIA matches. He traveled throughout the Midwest to grow his game, he was on various boards and committees in his home state of Iowa, and in 2002 started the popular Iowa Referee Academy, which is now titled in his name. Additionally, a few years ago NISOA leadership started the Terry Vaughn Referee of the Week Award.

Although Terry did much more in our game than I know to be able to share with you, I’ll do my best to share a few of the games and tournaments I got to be part of with Terry. We worked together on several NCAA matches, and were selected to work World Cup Qualifying, U20 World Cup Qualifying, Olympic Qualifying, CONCACAF Gold Cup, U20 World Cup, CONCACAF Champions League, and many, many more events. We also worked many MLS matches over the years, including a memorable 2005 semi-final between New England Revolution and Chicago Fire.

Through the years I was blessed to spend a lot of time with Terry, and I know many of you were blessed with a lot of time of your own with him. As we remember our good friend Terry, please also remember his amazing wife Kim and daughter Kyla – they are an incredible family who sacrificed their time with him so that we could have ours.

Terry will be greatly missed, and always remembered for his openness to listen to anyone who wanted to learn from and laugh with him. He didn’t care who you were – he was always there to get better, and help others get better.

Thanks for being a great one, TV! Your memory will live on!

George Gansner
Former FIFA Assistant Referee and NISOA Member