 What’s up fans, friends, and family?! How is everyone doing? I am reporting to you live from Wels, Austria my home for the next year. I apologize about it being so long, I had a busy summer working out and am just now getting settled in Austria.
As you may have read I signed with WBC Raiffeisen Wels in Austria’s top league, A Bundesliga. I shipped out to Austria from Richmond, VA on August 15th. My brothers Denzel Bowles and Chris Herron took me to the airport. We are all really close and it’s always tough to tell people see you in a year or 10 months, but they support me and have helped me through it all. It’s good to have people like that in your life and I know I’m blessed to be surrounded by really positive people.
I came out here early to meet my coaches, teammates, and management. I was the first import to arrive in Wels and I really like the fact that I was able to get a head start on getting adjusted to my surroundings, learning the plays, and building a relationship with my coaches. That’s the type of person and player I am, I like to get a jump start on things and make sure I am prepared for the task at hand.
The coaching staff is the biggest reason I chose to make Wels the next step in my pro career. My Head Coach, Pete Miller is American and has been coaching on the European scene for years. He has built great relationships all over Europe and is respected as a great basketball mind all over the world. Coach Miller and I have built a terrific connection and I know he is going to help me improve my game in order to succeed in Europe. I couldn’t have asked for a better situation.
 What’s up everybody? Hope this blog finds all my fans, friends, and family doing well. Since returning to the states I have just been trying to work out as much as possible and prepare for next season. I have been hitting the gym at my local high school with my right hand man Denzel Bowles in Virginia Beach and we have really been getting after it. I feel that I had a pretty good rookie year, but want to make some serious noise this coming season. I’m a man on a mission.
I’ve also been busy in the community, working with kids of all ages. On June 2nd, I actually worked an event in Richmond, Va with my best friend Chris Herron. Chris is a PE Teacher at Ginter Park-Mary Scott Elementary in Richmond City Public Schools.
Chris, or Coach H as the kids call him, put together a Family Fitness Day for the children of his school on the north side of Richmond. This Family Fitness Day brought a lot of the community out, including his principals, parents, and students. The goal for this event was to show families the benefits of physical fitness and how easy it is to have fun while working out. We set up several stations including basketball, football, hula hoops, jump roping, physical fitness and tennis. We also held several races for the students and adults towards the end of the day.
I manned the basketball station with my longtime friend Patrick Dillon, who played high school ball with Chris and I. We started each group off with some basic ball handling drills and then progressed to passing and then some shooting. Then we got the students in a lay-up line and let them show us their stuff. We would participate with them and throw down a dunk or two just to get them hyped up and we’d finish with a small game before rotating stations. Some of these students had real game! They were finishing with both hands, dribbling with their heads up and hitting shots I didn’t think they were capable of. Chris said he’d been getting their game right, but I was impressed!
We closed the event with a dunk contest between Pat and myself. The kids went wild over the dunk contest. We did something light, best of four dunks and let the crowd pick the winner. It was close, Pat through down some mean dunks, including a lob off the glass and a mean 360. I took the win though with a cuff windmill and of course I tried to include the kids, pulling one(Trey) from the crowd to throw me the alley-oop.
 What’s up everybody?! I’m reporting to you live and direct from the United States of America, St. Louis, Missouri to be exact. My season ended about two weeks ago and I have been on the move since I got home.
We lost in the first round of the playoffs and I shipped back to America earlier than I wanted to. I wound up averaging something like 17 points and nine rebounds a game while over in South America. It was a great learning experience for me and got my name out there in the Latin market. Really though, it was a good look playing with another American who has been in the game abroad so long. I want to give a huge shout out to my man Ramel Allen for taking me under his wing and filling me in on some secrets to the
business and giving me tips to be successful while playing overseas. I appreciate it boss!
I was lucky enough to fly into Richmond where I was picked up by my right hand man and got to stay with other family the Herron’s for a couple of days. Then I headed down to see my mother and little sister, I actually surprised my little sister at her elementary school and it made my day to see her face light up like that. She means the world to me.
After that I headed back through Richmond and embarked on my journey to see my OHIO Bobcats play in the NCAA Tournament. I drove to Athens where I met former OU baller Justin Orr and we made our way down to Nashville, Tennessee for the first round.
My young boys picked up two HUGE wins, beating Michigan in the first round and USF in the second. I was able to score tickets to both games and I gotta say it was one of the best experiences of my life. Of course I wish I was still playing (maybe I should’ve redshirted a year hahaha I’m playing), but man it was a great time to come home to.
We ended up meeting former Bobcat Asown Sayles too and the three of us had one of the best weekends of our lives down there in Nashville. It brought up a ton of memories from playing back at OU and I could not respect that program any more than I do. I really appreciate all that they have done for my life!
Now I am out here in St. Louis for the Sweet 16! Tunji and I got down here last night after a tough trip that included a popped tire, but we’re here! And I wouldn’t miss it for the world. I ended up meeting Orr, Sayles, and my Bobcat Brother Armon Bassett. OU lost the game, but battled UNC to the very last minute and went into overtime. They showed a lot of heart and competed with one of the powerhouse programs in the country. OHIO has finally arrived and I am honored to say that's where I played my college ball and attended college.
I am real proud of all my young boys that have been holding down OHIO this year. I couldn’t be more impressed with how they have developed individually and as a team. They deserve all the success they've had this year. I’m also really happy for Coach Groce, he deserves this run and is one of the best coaches in college basketball. To my Bobcats, keep your heads and stay together. You still have next year to top what you all did this season, how live would that be?! All of #BobcatNation is proud, you boys represented OU really well.
It was crazy being able to attend the NCAA Tournament run as a fan. So much different than when I was a player. The atmosphere is fun and there is always something to do. It was a great experience for having just got home, I feel like it all worked out perfectly and I'm hype I got to go. It brought up a lot of memories that I am really glad I was a part of at Ohio I can honestly say I love that place and those people. They have done a lot for my life and I thank them.
As for me, I’m not sure at this point if I’ll ship out one last time for a month or two or wait it out and prepare for NBA Summer League. I honestly just enjoyed watching OHIO and all of my Bobcat brothers play in the tournament.
Go Bobcats!
What’s good everybody? I hope this blog finds everyone doing well. I wanted to check in and give everyone an update on my career and how everything is going. Things have been crazy lately, I am actually in Montevideo, Uruguay right now. I was released from my team, Gelisim Koleji in Turkey on Sunday night and made the tough trip out here to South America.
In this blog I’d like to shed some light on my situation over in Turkey and explain how excited I am to be out here in Uruguay. Gelisim actually had a guard get hurt and management decided to bring in an American point guard. In the TB2l, the league I was playing in you can only play one American at a time. This surprised me because I had no clue he was coming and I thought I was playing pretty well. Our team was loaded with big men, but really thin at the point guard spot which was shown by our biggest problem as a team, our turnovers.
When the other American, Derrick Williams arrived, (by the way he is a real good dude and it was great to have another American to talk to and learn from) I knew my minutes would take a big hit. I tried my best to be really professional about it, I went to work every single day with a smile on my face, made no complaints, and tried to get better each day to earn my time.
After a few games of playing under ten minutes I set up a meeting with the coach and manager. I explained to them in the most mature way that I could that this situation was not good for my career and that I was looking for a job somewhere else. I can’t lie, I even asked to be sent back to the states before I found another job. The coach and manager really put things into perspective for me. They explained that they had to play the point guard because we were struggling so much to take care of the ball. They also made it clear that they weren’t upset with my performance, but they felt they were doing what was best for the team. The coach asked me to stay, saying that he understood it wasn’t the best move for my career right now, but it looks better for me to be a part of the team and continue to practice and get paid then head home to the states and sit around until the next gig opened up. I agreed to stay, because he was right. There was no point in going home with nothing else lined up especially with how the market for pro basketball players has been this year.
A couple of days later, my agent Jim Buckley from Pro Partner Sports Management contacted me and told me he had a job lined up with Bohemios, a team in the top league in Uruguay. I had expressed interest in playing in South America for a long time to him. I know it isn’t the most conventional route to be successful in Europe, but I wanted to see South America first hand and I have heard nice things about the basketball leagues over there. My agent said that we had no time to waste though, because they wanted me there the next day and had already purchased a very expensive plane ticket for me. That day, Monday February 13th, at 4:30 p.m. I hopped on a plane and headed to South America for what was the longest journey of my life haha. The flight from Madrid to Uruguay was 12 hours long, not including my layover and how long it took to get from Izmir to Madrid. Let’s just say it was a long day, but well worth it.
 What's up everybody? I just wanted to check in with all of my family, friends, and fans and say I hope everyone enjoyed their holidays and had a Happy New Year!
I spent the holidays here in Izmir, Turkey because we actually played a game on Christmas Day. The match really had a professional feel to it, I remember watching NBA games on Christmas every year growing up. Even though I was a little disappointed that I couldn't go home for the holidays, I understand the nature of the business and really tried to show up and play hard. It turned out I had my best game of the year! I finished with a career-high 30 points and 13 rebounds, but we lost late in the fourth quarter.
 Welcome to the personal blog for my website! I really appreciate you taking the time to check out both the site and the blog. My name as you can tell is DeVaughn Washington and I am from Virginia Beach, Va. I played my college ball at Ohio University, where we won a MAC Championship in 2010 and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament after defeating Georgetown. I am now living out my dreams as a professional basketball player for Gelisim Koleji in Izmir, Turkey.
I had this website created and am starting this blog to give my fans, friends, family, former teammates and coaches, and potential employers the chance to read about my experiences abroad. The website has news, stats, photos, and videos that I encourage you to check out. I am also available to contact on several different social networks, including a YouTube Channel, Facebook Fanpage, and twitter. I want to start this blog by again thanking you for taking the time to read it. All of the thoughts, opinions, experiences, and viewpoints expressed here are my own and in no way intended to upset anyone.
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