Arizona basketball recruiting: Hamidou Diallo expected to officially visit Arizona, could play right away

Diallo is eligible to play this season, if he so chooses

Five-star recruit Hamidou Diallo is expected to take an official visit to Arizona in early January, reports Adam Zagoria of ZagsBlog.com.

Diallo, a 6-foot-5 guard, is the No. 10 player in the 2017 class, and is the No. 1 shooting guard in the nation.

An interesting wrinkle? Diallo could enroll in college for the spring semester and therefore play right away wherever he chooses to go, as the NCAA has cleared him to do so. Yes, that means if Arizona lands Diallo, he could be suiting up for the team in the second half of this season — and we know how badly the Wildcats need depth right now.

“He’s really excited about Arizona and the possibility of going there,” Tom Espinosa, Diallo’s head coach at Putnam Science Academy, told AZ Desert Swarm in September. “Me, personally, I was very impressed with Coach (Sean) Miller and Coach (Book) Richardson.

“Arizona has a lot of future NBA players and that’s what they pitched to Hamidou. I know Arizona’s history with big, long, athletic guys who are great in transition and that’s him to a ‘T’ and he’d be a great fit at Arizona.”

The exact date for Diallo’s visit has not been finalized yet, per Espinosa, though presumably it would likely be either between Jan. 5-7 when Arizona hosts Utah and Colorado, or Jan. 12 when the Wildcats host ASU.

According to 247Sports Crystal Ball, UCONN and Kentucky are the frontrunners for Diallo. Diallo visted Connecticut on Dec. 21 and is expected to visit Kentucky in the next week or so.

For more on Diallo, check out Ricky O’Donnell’s piece on him.

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