Mark McLaughlin Leaving Washington

In a press release sent from the UW Athletic Department, it was announced today that Mark McLaughlin is leaving the Washington basketball program:

"“Mark McLaughlin has decided to leave the University of Washington to pursue other opportunities. Although he was only here for a short time, we enjoyed working with Mark and wish him the best in his future endeavors.” -Head Coach Lorenzo RomarCoach Romar and other school officials will have no further comment at this time."

There’s no other information other than that but we’ll keep this post updated if we learn more. He’s been a rolling stone for his entire basketball career and his pit stop at UW was no different.

This is a huge hit for this year’s team as McLaughlin is a highly skilled scorer who has the size and style to easily slip into Terrence Ross’ role and provide scoring from the wing. Even though he never played a game at the D1 level, I’ve talked to enough people with whom I trust to know that he could have made a big impact in the Pac-12. This puts a lot of pressure on RS-Senior Scott Suggs to take on a larger scoring role from the wing.

This puts a damper on the entire 2012 recruiting as there are now zero recruits that have come in from that class. Making it the worst in UW history. There were two transfers from Perris Blackwell and Gilles Dierickx.

On the other hand, Romar’s crowded 2013 recruiting class just got an extra scholarship to play with.