David Whitehurst, a College junior on the Penn basketball and track teams has been dismissed from the University for academic reasons, according a report last week by The Times of Trenton.
The disclosure puts to rest weeks of speculation and rumors about Whitehurst's status and supports several unconfirmed reports The Summer Pennsylvanian and other media outlets had received.
The athletic department has not made an announcement and has no plans to, and a spokesman only said that "we would never comment on a student-athlete's academic status."
The junior, who started 21 out of 29 basketball games last year, was expected to be a leading contributor to the team during the 2006-07 season.
Whitehurst has been playing in the Jersey Shore Basketball League on the USA Financial team this summer, along with former Quakers teammate Tim Begley.
According to Gary Purpura, an assistant dean in the College office who was not addressing the Whitehurst case specifically, a student could go directly from good standing to being taking off the rolls by receiving poor grades one semester.
The other case is that a student who was already on academic probation for receiving a semester GPA of below 2.0 could be dismissed from the University for falling below that mark a second time.
Dropping a student from the rolls "is really reserved for extreme cases," Purpura said. "It doesn't happen very frequently."
A student who is dropped from the rolls must wait one calendar year before applying to return to Penn.
At that time, if the student wishes to return, he is required to submit a letter describing the circumstances of the dismissal, what he has done during the year off, and his plans for the remainder of his academic career. The student's request would then be reviewed by the Committee on Undergraduate Academic Standing.
Purpura said that the University is looking for "anything that shows that they're making strides to turn things around.
"All this is done to get the students back to a place where they would be doing well academically," Purpura added.
As for the basketball team, Whitehurst's loss could mean more minutes for other guards such as sophomores Tommy McMahon and Kevin Egee, or even returning junior Mike Kach.
Whitehurst, a 6-foot-3 shooting guard, was one of only four Quakers to play in every game last season.
He averaged 5.8 points and 26.4 minutes per game.
Whitehurst's career high in points was 18, but his best performance came in December's game against then-No. 1 Duke. He scored 15 points on 5-for-7 shooting from the perimeter and brought down five boards.
The Penn track team will also feel the loss of Whitehurst, a first-team All-Ivy performer in the 110 meter hurdles two straight years.
Whitehurst finished second in the hurdles event at the ECAC/IC4A Championships in May and is widely regarded as a potential Olympian.
He declined to comment.
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