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Inside The Huskies

Diallo Wouldn't Be the First Player to Leave UW for Kentucky

The former Husky point guard will meet with Wildcats coach Mark Pope, who went this route.
Dan Raley|
Zoom Diallo looks for room to drive as a Penn State defender tries to cut him off.
Zoom Diallo looks for room to drive as a Penn State defender tries to cut him off. | Dave Sizer photo

Zoom Diallo, a local guy who recently left the University of Washington basketball program after two seasons as a starting guard to consider his options, will visit Kentucky this weekend, according to various insiders.

He'll meet with Wildcats coach Mark Pope, himself once a Seattle-area player who spent two seasons as a starting forward for the Huskies before he, too, transferred out and finished up at Kentucky.

Funny how that works.

Except for its few moments of glory with players such as Brandon Roy and Isaiah Thomas, both of whom have retired jerseys hanging in Alaska Airlines Arena, Husky basketball continues to be treated like a forgotten stepchild.

Again, the gory details for the UW: one NCAA Tournament berth in the past 15 seasons, two winning seasons over the past seven and six consecutive head coaches fired.

Even current leader Danny Sprinkle conceded fellow coaches told him he would be committing professional suicide if he came to Montlake.

After 13-18 and 16-17 seasons and a pair of roster implosions, Sprinkle no doubt has a better feel for why the program continues to struggle.

Zoom Diallo had his own following in the Dawg Pack.
Zoom Diallo had his own following in the Dawg Pack. | Dave Sizer photo

Like Roy and Thomas before him, Diallo was considered the latest program savior, someone who averaged 15.7 points per game this season and made himself into a much more accurate shooter.

In Zoom's defense for leaving, he probably realizes first-hand things aren't going to turn around fairly quickly for the UW in terms of team success so he's out shopping himself around.

It was just 19 months ago that Diallo met with local media members and was asked why Washington?

"Why not?" he shot back. "Why not just stay home and have your circle and everyone around you surrounding you?"

The 6-foot-4 guard from Tacoma was the state player of the year, considered the No. 3 point guard national recruit by ESPN and could have gone to any college program coming out of Curtis High School and California's Prolific Prep.

"With just the first few conversations I had with Sprinkle, I knew that was who I wanted to be my head coach," Diallo said.

After that first dreary season in 2025, in which the UW finished in last place in the Big Ten, the local kid was one of just two players who returned and he hung with the Huskies for a second sub-.500 season.

"It's a blessing and a dream come true," Diallo initially said once of pulling on a UW jersey.

And, like Mark Pope before him, he will now consider trading in the purple for a Kentucky shirt.

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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