Tatum leaps to defence of McLaughlin

Illawarra Hawks coach Justin Tatum jumped on the front foot over some erroneous reporting about the departure of JaQuori McLaughlin after his team's emphatic first win of NBL26.

The Hawks and import guard McLaughlin came to a mutual agreement to part company after the first three games of the season that were defeats at the hands of the Tasmania JackJumpers, Perth Wildcats and New Zealand Breakers.

Illawarra responded on Saturday night in Wollongong racing to a 22-2 lead on the way to a 27-point win over the Brisbane Bullets.

While it hadn’t worked out in a basketball perspective with McLaughlin with the Hawks, Tatum had been perturbed by reporting around his departure and wanted to quickly set the record straight in no uncertain terms.

"The report was false and that young man was nothing but a pleasure for our organisation, and in our locker room on and off the court," Tatum said.

"He was truly a professional and helped us every day while he was here, and the departure was mutual.

"At the end of the day this is a business, but the false representation that was put out there was totally false and we wanted to make sure we cleared that up because he's an unbelievable kid."

McLaughlin averaged 7.7 points and 4.0 assists and while it didn’t work out in terms of a fit on the Hawks team, Tatum couldn’t have been more impressed with his attitude the whole time.

"Everything that I read in that was false. He was no cancer, nothing at all," Tatum said.

"We pretty much dislike that he's gone just because of who he is, but this is a business and we get it. But I don’t want anything to be put out there negatively about that kid because he was nothing but a great person in that locker room.

"We're going to miss him and we understand that things are going to happen, but we don’t want anyone to put bad representation of news out there. We all had some part of us being 0-3 and it wasn't all just on one man."

With the way Tyler Harvey stepped up with 22 points and 10 assists as a point guard against Brisbane and with Davo Hickey on the verge of a return, Tatum doesn’t feel it necessarily has to be a point guard that the Hawks replace McLaughlin with.

"We want an import player and somebody that can help impact our team, and to help us get wins like tonight," Tatum said.

"We want someone that's the same professional as JaQuori was and it's all about them being able to help us on the basketball court.

"We want to make sure that whoever we bring in fits our culture on and off the court. Our culture is different to everyone else and our locker room is extremely tight, and somebody has to come in and understand that and accept the role that is given to them.

"Hopefully they can flourish in that but there's no rush to bring someone in and that may or may not fit us because of their ability."