01:00 AM EST on Thursday, December 15, 2005

PROVIDENCE -- It was about a half-hour after the Providence College game last Saturday night at The Dunk, the Friars having lost to Memphis, and there in the hallway outside the locker room was Dwight Brewington.

The same Dwight Brewington who left the Friars shortly before the season started.

The same Dwight Brewington who would have been the Friars' leading returning scorer.

The same Dwight Brewington whose absence has hurt this young PC team.

"Was it a big decision for you to leave the team?" he was asked.

"It wasn't a big decision," he said. "It was a great decision."

"Why is that?"

"Me and the coach just didn't see eye to eye," he said.

Stop the presses?

Not exactly.

It's no secret Brewington was unhappy during his freshman year, no secret that there always was a certain friction between Brewington and Tim Welsh, no secret that Brewington seemed to fit the profile of a young player trying to make the adjustment to college basketball and finding it more difficult than he'd envisioned.

The word then was Brewington often threatened to transfer, the underlying premise being that he never seemed happy to be at Providence College. Maybe that was the result of his well-publicized deafness, things that had nothing to do with basketball. Maybe it was the result of what was happening on the court. Regardless, Brewington often seemed frustrated, like a poem out of rhyme.

It also was no secret that the Friar staff considered Brewington high maintenance. Welsh says he spent more time with Brewington than with any other player, that he knew when he recruited someone with the kind of handicap Brewington has they all were dealing in uncharted waters. And that even though he and his staff tried to be sensitive to Brewington's needs, "any player has to adjust to the team concept, too."

So the fact that Saturday night Brewington said he and Welsh didn't exactly see eye to eye?

Welcome to college basketball in this new millennium, where player discontent often is as much a part of every program as a strength coach and a recruiting budget. Where there's often a big disconnect between how a player views himself and how a coach views the player.

"Playing for him was like being in the military," Brewington said. "It wasn't fun. That's just the way he runs his program. I was never happy here, right from the beginning."

He paused a beat.

"But it's not like I dislike him or anything," he added. "I just didn't like playing for him. So I want to go somewhere else."

He admitted he sometimes had a difficult attitude, that sometimes he wasn't happy, but that it was only because basketball is so important to him, and he didn't think it was working out as well as it should have been.

It's also no secret Brewington wanted to be a point guard, always has envisioned himself as playing like Jason Kidd does, but that never happened with the Friars. There's little question this was a constant source of frustration, this sense he was being played out of position, his belief that he once was promised he was going to be a point guard.

Welsh, in turn, says Brewington was told during the recruiting process that he would have an opportunity to grow into that role, but that "he had to have more assists than turnovers, and that didn't happen."

Still, Welsh is surprised it's all played out the way it has.

"He used to come here and we'd talk about a lot of things," says Welsh. "At times, he seemed happy. His mother was happy he was here. I had total compassion for everything he had to deal with. But it was never easy for him. Frustrated. That's probably the word."

Brewington's plan is to leave PC after exams end next week.

To just exactly where?

Brewington wasn't specific. Maybe La Salle. Maybe Drexel. Maybe Gonzaga. Maybe Arizona. Someone will take him. You can count on that. He averaged 13 points a game last year, a credential that will get him a second chance in college basketball, a new blank slate upon which to try to write a new script.

Welsh met with Brewington last week, went over some of his options.

"There are no hard feelings," he said. "I still want what's best for Dwight. Hopefully, a fresh start will work out for him."

That sounds good to Brewington.

A new place, a new start, a new life, a new chance to chase old dreams.

"I want to get away from here," said Dwight Brewington. "Go do my own thing somewhere. I want to go somewhere where I'm going to be happy. I want to walk around with a smile on my face."

What he never had here.