UCI’s Swanwick Transfers to Rancho Santiago : Basketball: Redshirt freshman becomes second player to leave Anteater program in a month.

IRVINE —  Rick Swanwick, a reserve center who has been considering leaving the UC Irvine basketball program since last season, has told Irvine Coach Rod Baker that he is transferring to Rancho Santiago College.

“It didn’t turn out as I had hoped at Irvine, so I decided to move on,” said Swanwick, a 6-foot-10 redshirt freshman who was bothered by an injury to his Achilles’ tendon last season. He appeared in 13 games, averaging fewer than three minutes a game.

Swanwick became the second player to transfer from Irvine this month. Dylan Rigdon, who averaged 11.7 points and would have been the Anteaters’ leading returning scorer, recently announced that he will transfer. Rigdon has not said where he will go.

Swanwick was The Times Orange County player of the year at Trabuco Hills High School, but he was disappointed in his performance and playing time at Irvine.

“I didn’t do what I should have been doing,” he said. “I didn’t work hard enough. I was lackadaisical. I didn’t produce and it was my fault.”

Swanwick said he plans to play at Rancho Santiago for a year, and then “hopefully go back to a four-year school.”

“I didn’t live up to my expectations,” Swanwick said. “I need to go somewhere else and get better so I can go somewhere else and live up to them.”

Irvine has eight returning players, led by starting point guard Gerald McDonald and forwards Jeff Von Lutzow and Gerald McDonald. The Anteaters will add guard Keith Stewart, a transfer from Marquette, Elzie Love of Perris High School and Zuri Williams of Oakland Bishop O’Dowd High School. Baker also said he has invited forward Elgin Rogers to rejoin the team. Rogers, a 6-6 scholarship player, was dismissed from the team last season by then-coach Bill Mulligan for an undisclosed but reportedly minor disciplinary problem.