Junior guard Greivis Vasquez has officially withdrawn his name from the 2009 NBA Draft.

Vasquez’s statement from the press release after the jump:

“After a great deal of thought, consideration and research, I have decided to withdraw my name from the NBA Draft and return to the University of Maryland for my senior year,” Vasquez said. “It has always been a goal of mine to graduate from the University of Maryland and earn my degree. When I signed a scholarship to come to Maryland, I promised my family back home in Venezuela that I would graduate, and doing so in four years here at Maryland will be a great achievement. The experience that I have gained over the past few weeks has been invaluable and something that will help me to better prepare to play professional basketball after my senior season. I would like to thank my family, my coaches and all my teammates who have supported me throughout this process.”

Vasquez continued…

“I believe we can really be a great team this upcoming season, and I am looking forward to working hard this summer with my teammates to make that happen,” Vasquez said. “We had a great finish to the season last year, and if we keep working really hard, we can have a successful season.”

Not much analysis necessary here.  The Terps needed Vasquez to return to have a successful campaign next season. Vasquez wasn’t a first round draft lock and said Europe was not an option at this point. It’s the right decision, by all means.

Coach Gary Williams told ESPN’s Andy Katz he thinks Vasquez can be a top-20 pick in next year’s draft. That might be stretching it just a bit, but with an improved shooting stroke and what should be a thinner point guard class this time next year, Vasquez has a much better chance of being a first round pick and getting that guaranteed NBA contract.

More on Vasquez’s decision process throughout the week as news leaks out, hopefully including a story in Thursday’s The Diamondback summer print edition.

akrautdbk@gmail.com

This entry was posted on Monday, June 15th, 2009 at 5:21 pm and is filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.