Washington State reserve guard Jamar Ergas becomes second player in as many days to leave Cougars

PULLMAN – The mass exodus of Washington State men’s basketball players has spilled into Wednesday.

One day after sophomore point guard Malachi Flynn announced plans to transfer from WSU and two days after junior forward Robert Franks declared for the NBA Draft without an agent, little-used redshirt freshman guard Jamar Ergas is also on the way out.

VerbalCommits.com was the first to report Ergas would be leaving the program. WSU coach Ernie Kent later confirmed the news to The Spokesman-Review, stating “He’s a great student, he’s been a great teammate and we wish him well.”

A reserve guard for the Cougars, Ergas logged just 16 minutes during his first collegiate season and may have been hard-pressed to see much of a spike in playing time next year. WSU returns four guards – Viont’e Daniels, Carter Skaggs, Kwinton Hinson and Milan Acquaah – and brings in CJ Elleby, a small forward who often acted as the primary ball-handler for his Cleveland High (Seattle) team.

“He needs to play and it’s going to be hard for him to do that here,” Kent said.

Ergas, a native of Toronto, Ontatrio, who came to WSU by way of the Elite 1 Academy in Arizona, only played in 10 games this season for the Cougars and never played more than three minutes in a single contest. He scored four points for WSU, making two shots near the end of a blowout loss to Arizona on Jan. 31 in Pullman.

When the 2017-18 season ended, there was a chance the Cougars would only have to fill two scholarships with the departure of senior grad transfer Drick Bernstine and former walk-on Steven Shpreyregin. They signed Elleby to fill one of those vacancies but now have two, and potentially three more roster spots to take care of.

Ergas becomes the 10th player to transfer from the Cougars under fourth-year coach Ernie Kent.