A new guard
Diarra transfers to UConn from Texas A&M
Mamadou Diarra never was able to play significant minutes for UConn men’s basketball coach Dan Hurley, but his younger brother will have the chance.
Hassan Diarra, who just completed his sophomore season at Texas A&M, has transferred to UConn. Hassan Diarra made the announcement on Twitter Wednesday.
“It’s very exciting,” Diarra said told Hearst Connecticut Media. “The history of UConn, their guards. Being from the East Coast, it’s definitely a big deal to play at UConn with their rich history of winning and developing great guards. I built a great relationship with the coaches, and I felt like there was a lot of opportunity for me there.”
Certainly, it didn’t hurt that his older brother Mamadou played for UConn and has been a student/ graduate assistant coach with the program for the past three years.
“Ultimately, it was just about Coach Hurley, Coach Kimani (Young), Coach (Luke) Murray and Coach Tom (Moore), and the job they did with me,” Diarra said.
Diarra, a 6-foot-2 guard, played 18 games for the Aggies last season, making six starts, and averaged 6.2 points and 1.4 assists per game. He finished second on the team with 19 steals.
He also had a knack for clutch shots. Last season, Diarra hit three 3-pointers that either tied the game or won the game for the Aggies: with .9 left on the clock for an 81-80 win over Abilene Christian; with 0.1 seconds left for an 83-80 win over Florida in the SEC tournament; and with 9.3 seconds left to tie Arkansas 64-64.
“I think it’s just a testament to how hard I work,” Diarra noted. “I work hard every day, and it showed in the biggest moments.”
Diarra, a Queens, N.Y. product, prepped for three years at nearby Putnam Science Academy, which he led to national championships in 2018-19 and 2019-20. He finished as the program’s all-time leading scorer with 1,469 points, passing current Detroit Piston Hamidou Diallo in the last few games of his career.
“He won a lot of games, has a lot of records here,” PSA coach Tom Espinosa said. “He’s just a winner.
That’s the first word that comes to mind when I hear Hassan Diarra: winner. He’s not flashy, he’s not a phenomenal shooter or crazy explosive or an unbelievable ballhandler, he’s just kind of good at everything. He’s a gamer. He wants the ball in his hands. That’s who he is.”
A consensus national top-75 recruit, he wasn’t really recruited by UConn out of high school, even though his older brother played for the Huskies and has been a student/graduate assistant coach there since 2019. Mamadou Diarra, who also played at PSA, played under coach Kevin Ollie in 2017-18 but appeared in just two games under Hurley in 2018-19 before chronic knee conditions forced him to discontinue his college playing career and accept a medical disqualification. He graduated from UConn in May
2020 with a degree in Urban and Community Studies, and received a master’s degree this past weekend.
It’s not clear yet whether Mamadou Diarra will remain at UConn in a new capacity, though that is a possibility.
“I don’t know what his plans are,” Hassan said. “I think he’s still trying to figure it out.”
UConn has already brought in veteran transfers Tristen Newton (a 6-5 point guard from East Carolina) and Nahiem Alleyne (a 6-4 shooting guard from Virginia Tech) to join 6-5 rising sophomore Jordan Hawkins and 6-6 rising junior Andre Jackson in the backcourt. Hassan Diarra certainly could work his way into the starting lineup or see starter’s minutes, but more likely will play a more limited role off the bench — with the prospect of seeing more playing time the following season.
“Bringing in my leadership, my competitiveness, playing with these guys like
Nahiem, Tristen, Andre, Adama (Sanogo) — those are very good players,” Diarra said. “Adding me as a piece to the puzzle, I can find those guys, get them open and have a lot of fun with them.”
“At A&M, it was so upand-down with him,” Espinosa noted. “Some games he’d play 25 minutes, other times just five minutes. Obviously, any kid would love to start, but he’s a kid I know would accept his role, whatever he is. If he’s coming off the bench, as long as he’s playing significant minutes, to a certain degree, I think he’ll be fine with whatever role it is.”
Seton Hall and Arizona State are among the other schools that had interest in Diarra out of the portal.
“Whatever the team needs me to be,” he said of his role. “We’re competing for a Big East championship and a national championship.”“