It started this morning as a messageboard rumor, but this evening ESPN's Dana O'Neil reported, and the Villanova athletics department confirmed, that Taylor King has voluntarily withdrawn from the men's basketball program.
According to Villanova.com, Taylor plans to remain at Villanova as a student. He will complete his degree requirements, but will not remain a part of the intercollegiate basketball program. He had two years of eligibility left after transferring from Duke, he would be going into his fourth years of college, and should be relatively close to completing his degree.
According to O'Neil's source and some of the earlier rumors this morning, King's withdrawal was the result of some violation of team rules.
King was one of a couple of McDonald's All-Americans on the Main Line recently. He averaged 7.5 points per game and 5.3 rebounds per game for the Wildcats, while shooting 36.4% from beyond the arc.
This likely means more playing time for Isaiah Armwood as well as the talented freshman duo of JayVaughn Pinkston and James Bell next year. By the end of the 2009-2010 season, however, King saw very limited minutes -- he did not take the court against West Virginia at the end of the season, and only saw single-digit minutes against Marquette in the Big East tournament and St. Mary's in the NCAA tournament.
Update (6/22): Since dsproul03 asked for information on how the scholarship situation works, I'll reposts some information I looked up a few months ago when Jason Colenda left the program:
If a scholarship player voluntarily leaves the program, his scholarship becomes available to any other eligible non-scholarship player ...
A voluntary withdrawal makes the scholarship available again at the beginning of the next academic term. It is the reason why Kentucky is able to heavily recruit after five underclassmen went pro -- their withdrawal was voluntary and their scholarships became open. If a player withdraws in November, however, you cannot use their scholarship again until after exams end in December.
If you would like to read the actual rule, here it is:
15.5.2.2 VoluntaryWithdrawal. An institution may replace a counter who voluntarily withdraws from the team in a head-count sport by providing the financial aid to another student who already has enrolled in the institution and is a member of the team. For this replacement to occur, the counter must withdraw prior to the first day of classes or before the first game of the season, whichever is earlier, and release the institution from its obligation to provide financial aid. The institution may not award the financial aid to another student-athlete in the academic term in which the aid was reduced or canceled. Further, if the financial aid is canceled before a regular academic term (e.g., preseason practice period), the aid may not be provided to another student-athlete during the ensuing academic term.
See Also:
- Ballin' is a Habit's take on the matter
- Coverage from Chris Lane at The Nova Blog (and one from jhulax22)
- Jon Tannenwald knows about as much as we do at Philly.com
- Joe Juliano covered this for the Philly Inquirer, while Dick Jerardi has the Daily News' take.