Diakite To Return To Virginia For One More Season

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Wahoo Nation was rejoicing late Wednesday night after Mamadi Diakite made an 11th-hour announcement that he had withdrawn his name from the NBA Draft and would return to Virginia for his final year of eligibility.

Players had a midnight deadline to notify the NBA that they were pulling their names out.

Diakite chose to make his announcement via his Instagram account.

“I am excited to announce that after testing the waters and getting great exposure and encouraging feedback, I have decided to return to the University of Virginia for my senior year,” Diakite wrote. “I can’t wait to join my coaches and teammates and get to work as we try to win another one.”

Diakite enjoyed a solid redshirt junior season and really upped his game in the six NCAA tournament games en route to the national championship. He is expected to be one of the anchors of a very young UVA team next season.

Coach Tony Bennett will welcome back point guard Kihei Clark, guard Braxton Key, 7-foot-1 forward Jay Huff, and Diakite among the regulars returning. Also back will be forward Francesco Badocchi, 7-foot center Francisco Caffaro, guard Cody Stattman, and former walkon Austin Katstra, along with Jayden Nixon.

The Cavaliers also have four signees for the 2019 class: shooting guard Tomas Woldentensae of Indian Hills Community College in Iowa; wing Justin McCoy of Cary, N.C.; guard Casey Morsell of Washington, D.C.; and center Kadin Shedrick of Holly Springs, N.C.

UVA’s most recent transfer, 6-9 Sam Hauser of Marquette, will not be eligible to play next season, but will be eligible for the 2020-21 campaign. He has one year of eligibility remaining.

Diakite announced he would test the waters along with teammates De’Andre Hunter, Ty Jerome, and Kyle Guy, but was not invited to the NBA Combine, especially after a mediocre performance in the G-League Elite Camp. He worked out for the Golden State Warriors and Sacramento Kings last week and said he would await feedback before he made a decision about his future.

Perhaps Diakite gave us a bit of a hint during an interview after his workout with the Kings when he said, “I am very thankful and grateful for the opportunity. If you look back at the time that people didn’t get to do this, if you were trying to test the water, you were done. You had no way back to college. But now, we get the opportunity to come to a great facility like this, meet hall of famers, and go back to school.

“So with that experience, you know how much you have to work, you know your weaknesses, and everything, so it’s really good.”