Seth Allen transferring from Maryland, granted release by school

UPDATE: The University of Maryland just issued the following release, announcing Seth Allen has been granted his release from his scholarship:

Maryland men's basketball head coach Mark Turgeon announced today that rising junior Seth Allen has been granted his release.

"I've grown close to Seth and his family over the past few years, so I am disappointed he has decided to leave Maryland," said head coach Mark Turgeon. "I wish Seth the best."

In two seasons with the Terps, Allen played in 56 games and averaged 9.8 points, 2.5 assists and 2.1 rebounds, while missing 14 games to injury.

Confirmation has come from a more reliable source -- Maryland point guard Seth Allen intends to transfer from the school, ESPN's Jeff Goodman is reporting. Allen joins departed players Shaq Cleare, Nick Faust and Roddy Peters as Maryland players bailing ship, in an exodus reminiscent of Randy Edsall's first year with the football program.

Head coach Mark Turgeon initially denied the news, first reported by Alex Kline:

Text from Mark Turgeon on Seth Allen asking for his release: "Not correct."

— Alex Prewitt (@alex_prewitt) April 30, 2014

Granted, he said something similar when rumors about Nick Faust popped up. Doesn't mean it might not happen, but it hasn't.

— Alex Prewitt (@alex_prewitt) April 30, 2014

ESPN's Goodman confirmed it with Allen, with the following quote.

"I had a great two years there," Allen said. "And I'm thankful for the opportunity, but I also feel as though it's time for me to move on."

Allen's mom slightly refuted the story, but it seems that they're just waiting on the paperwork to clear."

Just talked with Seth Allen's mother. Was on the other line with Maryland. "Nothing's settled," she said. "That's all I can say."

— Alex Prewitt (@alex_prewitt) May 2, 2014

Allen missed the first part of last year with a foot injury, returning to make a huge impact as a scoring guard, averaging 13.4 points per game, increasing his shooting numbers across the board and cutting down on his turnovers (even while seeing his minutes increase drastically).

The news comes as an absolute shock -- before the initial report yesterday, Allen was never even so much as mentioned as a potential departure. With incoming blue-chip point guard Melo Trimble and a graduate transfer likely, Allen could have seen a crunch for playing time and decided it wasn't for him.

This leaves Maryland in a pretty terrible situation at guard. Trimble is the team's only point guard, with Wells and Dion Wiley as the only other two scholarship guards on the entire team.

Trimble, for his part, doesn't seem to mind, tweeting this as soon as the news broke (click on it to see, but it's a sun smiling).

— Melo Trimble (@_STAYMELO) May 2, 2014

The news is terrible for Mark Turgeon, who has seen his job security plummet during his third offseason -- an offseason that was expected to be a good one for the coach. He has lost nearly half of his roster after his third year with the school, including his second-leading scorer, and will now have to rely heavily on unproven freshmen to achieve even a moderate amount of success in his fourth year. That being said, he has a good level of talent still available -- Dez Wells, Jake Layman and Evan Smotrycz will be the undisputed leaders of this team and will be relied upon for large amounts of scoring, and that top 10 recruiting class will likely be seeing a lot more early action than we previously thought. We'll just have to wait and see how it all plays out.