Guy, Diakite waived on eve of start of NBA season

By Jerry Ratcliffe

Two members of Virginia’s 2019 national championship squad, Kyle Guy and Mamadi Diakite, were waived by their respective NBA teams over the weekend.

Diakite was waived by the Oklahoma City Thunder after suffering a fracture to his left hip in a preseason game against his old club, Milwaukee. Diakite is out indefinitely with the injury.

He was fighting for a roster spot with the Thunder when he got hurt, but OKC coach Mark Daigneault said Diakite’s future with the club doesn’t change much due to the injury.

“Availability matters, but there’s a lot of other factors that go into those decisions, and most of them are strategy decisions that have to do with future planning, contracts, stuff like that,” Daigneault told reporters.

“That’ll all still get weighed and we still have time to make those decisions. That’s what our general manager is working on right now.”

Diakite averaged 3.1 points and 10.1 minutes over 14 games after being called up late in the season by the Bucks prior to his release.

Meanwhile, Guy was waived by the Cleveland Cavaliers, although sources said that the plan is to have him play for the club’s G-League team, the Cleveland Charge, assuming he is unclaimed on waivers.