Challe Barton Leaving Oregon State To Pursue Overseas Career

Building the Dam has confirmed that incoming senior point guard Challe Barton has left Oregon State and will pursue a career overseas.

The rumor that has been circulating in the past week or so was first confirmed by The Daily Barometer on Sunday. He is the third player to leave Oregon State's men's basketball team this month. Barton is currently home in his native Sweden trying to start a career there.

He scored eight points in nine minutes in his first ever game with the Beavers, but his first introduction with most of Beaver Nation came three months later when he clanked what would have been an overtime forcing three-pointer against Oregon. Barton's playing time increased significantly as a sophomore, and it paid off when he scored 11 points in 35 minutes in a 67-66 win at Washington State. He set a new career high three weeks later, but in a loss at Utah.

After Ahmad Starks transferred from Oregon State to Illinois before last season, Barton became the team's lone returning point guard. He dropped eight points, six rebounds, and six assists in a win against Towson, then had a 13 point outburst at Hawaii.

Barton's demise would start a week later. He lost confidence in his shot and started turning the ball over with more regularity, and 14 games into the year, was replaced in the starting lineup by up-and-coming freshman Hallice Cooke.

Soon after, another freshman, Malcolm Duvivier, jumped Barton on the depth chart. He averaged 4.9 MPG in the final 17 games of the year, six of which he did not play in at all.

With playing time like that, it is no surprise Barton is leaving. The Beavers now have two open scholarship spots and can widen the number of transfers they are looking at.