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+------- Thread: WKU just got a lot better-Another former top 60 recruit eligible (/thread-839774.html)
WKU just got a lot better-Another former top 60 recruit eligible - UABfan1 - 01-10-2018 06:08 PM
NORFOLK, Va. — Western Kentucky redshirt-sophomore Moustapaha Diagne has been cleared by the NCAA and is now eligible to play immediately.
Diagne, a 6-foot-9, 230-pound native of Senegal, missed the first 16 games of the season while the NCAA reviewed his amateurism. His availability gives WKU 10 active players moving forward, nine of whom are on athletic scholarship.
He's expected to join his teammates in Norfolk, Va., where the Hilltoppers are scheduled to face Old Dominion at 7 p.m. CST Thursday.
Diagne has been a Western Kentucky student since August of 2016 but didn’t officially join the school’s basketball program until this past summer. He played the 2015-16 year at Northwest Florida State, a junior college in Niceville, Fla., where he averaged 10.2 points and 7.3 rebounds per game.
But after that season Diagne mistakenly entered his name in the NBA Draft unaware National Junior Collegiate Athletic Association rules wouldn’t allow him to return to NFS. He opted to enroll at WKU and as a traditional student.
Diagne played at Pope John XXIII High School in Sparta, N.J., for three years while living with guardian David Wilder. He committed to Syracuse in May of 2014 and signed with SU in November of that year as a four-star prospect with offers from Cincinnati, Connecticut, Kansas, Memphis, Minnesota, Seton Hall, Villanova, West Virginia and others.
After averaging 17.2 points and 13.9 rebounds as a junior and 14.7 points and 12 rebounds as a senior while becoming an all-state selection, he announced in August of 2015 he wouldn’t attend Syracuse after all.
Diagne (pronounced Jun) is expected to make his debut Thursday at ODU. Western Kentucky is also scheduled to play at Charlotte on Saturday.
— Follow WBKO sportswriter Chad Bishop on Twitter @MrChadBishop