Over the next few weeks, PowerMizzou.com will take a look back at the season for each of the Tigers’ rotational players. This week, we’ll start with Mohamed Diarra.
Diarra wasn’t in head coach Dennis Gates’ rotation right away. The junior forward came to Missouri rated by JUCORecruiting.com as the No. 1 junior college player in the 2022 class out of Garden City Community College. But Diarra made just five appearances through Mizzou’s first 15 games of the season, never playing more than five minutes.
Gates said that each newcomer on the team had to go through a “transition.” He thought that Diarra’s just took a little longer, being a Montreuil, France native and having no NCAA Division I experience.
The 6-foot-10 big man started seeing consistent minutes a few games into the Tigers’ SEC slate. He played nine minutes in the team’s road game against Texas A&M on Jan. 11 and saw his role gradually expand from then on.
Diarra made an immediate impact on the glass. Per KenPom, he led Mizzou by grabbing 12.3% of available offensive rebounds and 21.1% of available defensive rebounds while he was on the floor. He was an especially welcome addition to a team that finished second-to-last in the country in defensive rebounding rate.
He was productive on defense, too, rejecting shots on 6.5% of possessions, the highest mark on the team, and coming up with a steal on 2.5% of possessions. Diarra cracked the starting lineup for the first time in a road game against Mississippi State on Feb. 21 and stayed there over the next five games. His ability to match up with the opposing team’s biggest player helped free up senior forward Kobe Brown, who at 6-foot-8 was often undersized for the task. But when needed, he was also able to switch onto guards and showed enough lateral quickness to keep up on the perimeter.
Offensively, Diarra flashed many of the tools that Gates values from his forwards on offense. He runs the floor well, he gets to the rim often and even knocked down four 3-pointers.
Diarra did see some of the holes in his game get exposed the more he played. Listed at 215 pounds, Diarra was occasionally too light to handle some of the bigger post players in the SEC. He also could get too anxious chasing after blocks — Diarra committed 6.2 fouls per 40 minutes.
His touch and overall confidence on offense waned as well. According to CBB Analytics, Diarra connected on just 45.7% of his shots inside the paint. Defenses sagged off on him when he spotted up from outside, as he went just 4-16 from deep for the season.
“He just wants to be perfect and sometimes when you have young people wanting to be perfect, they miss out on the opportunities,” Gates said after the Tigers’ loss to Alabama in the SEC tournament semifinals on March 11. “I don't want him to ever measure himself based off of how many 'points' I have. I want him to measure himself off the whole game, how he's impacting defensively, how he's impacting by making the extra pass, how he's impacting rebounding, how he's impacting even the personality of our team. So you just gotta manage young people who want to be perfect, especially on this stage … He just wants to play well and represent his family, represent our institution and his teammates well. He doesn't want to let anyone down.”
Diarra should find a more consistent role next season, which could lead to more consistent production. The Tigers will hope to lean on the forward a little more next year.
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