Puyallup High career assist leader Jaden Vollmen commits to Bellevue College

Former Puyallup High boys basketball standout Jaden Vollmen has found a home.

After a prolific career with the Puyallup Vikings — finishing as the school’s all-time greatest passer after capturing both the single-season (206, 2014-2015) and career (505) assist records — Vollmen left as one of the greatest players to come out of the boys basketball program under coach Scott Campbell.

But even after such a prolific prep career, there wasn’t much out there for the former Viking guard.

“I never expected coming in that I would have that much success in high school,” said Vollmen about breaking the program’s all-time career assist record. “But those are memories that will never be taken away from me.”

Vollmen has now taken the route by heading to Bellevue College to play for the Bulldogs men’s basketball team in the NWAACC.

“It’s good because I feel like I’ve put a lot of time and effort into the sport. Not just to play at the next level, but just because I’ve always enjoyed doing it,” Vollmen said. “It was always I loved to do in continuing all that. It feels good to have that now.”

From grade-school to high school to, now, college basketball, Vollmen, in a lot of ways, solidifies the philosophy of Campbell.

Ever since Campbell began hosting youth camps, it has created an opportunity for players in the area to continue their dreams of playing basketball beyond high school. Many have come into the Vikings program and continued playing at a higher level.

“I think it’s a great fit for him, and Bellevue is a high quality community college program,” Campbell said. “And (it has a) great coaching staff. I’m really excited for Jaden, because I think it’s a great fit and a great opportunity for him to continue to be playing.”

Vollmen was part of the first class to start Campbell’s dream. The first to come up from the those camps and into the Puyallup boys basketball program, and certainly the first in leading some of the most exciting basketball the program has witnessed in more than a decade.

And when it was all over, their prep careers put to rest, Vollmen became the first player in decades to reach a sacred Viking milestone.

He was the first to create that history; not as an individual, but together with his teammates, a ragtag that was with him along the way, pulling Vollmen up every time he was knocked down.

In the end, with the lights having gone out inside his old high school gymnasium, it was always about that brotherhood cultivated since childhood in those camps on summer days gone bye.

“All the guys on that team, that’s how we all fell in love with the sport,” said Vollmen on growing up with former teammates like Devin Neff, Tony Guiterrez and Tyler Togerson. “Just in the backyard playing basketball with each other.”

This opportunity with the Bellevue College Bulldogs is only the first highlight of Jaden Vollmen’s college career — one that’s he’s sure to add to down the road.

This story was originally published September 7, 2016 at 1:57 PM with the headline "Puyallup High career assist leader Jaden Vollmen commits to Bellevue College."