Washington men’s basketball: Are Huskies good enough to make NCAA tourney?
Franck Kepnang, left, and Zoom Diallo on Tuesday morning at the new UW basketball practice facility in Seattle, Washington, on October 28, 2025. (Kevin Clark / The Seattle Times)
By Percy Allen Seattle Times staff reporter
At the start of offseason workouts for the Washington men’s basketball team, just two players reported to the weight room: Franck Kepnang and Zoom Diallo.
Seven of their teammates left via the transfer portal while the other five graduated or retired from basketball, which left them feeling uncertain about the future of the Husky program.
“In this day and age, and the current climate of college basketball, we as players are not surprised anymore at just how things unfold,” said Kepnang, a sixth-year center who played two years at Oregon before transferring to Washington in 2022. “We’re at a place where you wait to see who is going to stay and who’s going to be the guys that we’re going to be rocking with next year.
“There’s just a lot of questions and no one has any answers. That’s what I remember.”
Those were long, lonely days in April for the pair of Husky holdovers.
“Yeah, it was just me and big Franck,” Diallo said. “Not going to lie, we kind of formed a special little bond because of that. It was my first year dealing with the portal and it was different.
“To be honest, I had no clue who they were going to bring in. They don’t really ask us or plug us in on those things. So, I had no clue what was going on.”
In the aftermath of Washington’s 2024-25 season, which produced a disappointing 13-18 record and last-place finish in the Big Ten at 4-16, Diallo met with coach Danny Sprinkle to reaffirm his commitment.
“Being from here and someone who’s always watched UW basketball, I knew how we ended last year was an impression I didn’t want to stay with,” said Diallo, a Tacoma native who won back-to-back 4A state championship at Curtis High before playing his senior season at Prolific Prep in California. “I didn’t want to leave town saying, ‘I didn’t give it my all.’
“I’m committed to changing Husky basketball. That’s my main focus. I have a lot of conversations with guys who played here like IT (Isaiah Thomas), Coach Q (Quincy Pondexter) and Coach (Abdul) Gaddy. This city will show a different type of love when there’s a winning culture here. I’ve seen that. I was in those stands. Now I want to be a part of that.”
Diallo is also anxious to improve on a first year in which he averaged 11.1 points, 3.1 rebounds and 2.7 assists while starting 22 of 31 games. The 6-foot-4 sophomore guard spent the summer working on his perimeter shot after shooting 18.2% (6 of 33) on three-pointers last season.
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“Year 2 is going to be a major jump,” Diallo said. “I’m going to surprise a lot of people.”
Kepnang, who has played 32 games in three seasons due to knee injuries, is focused on staying healthy after averaging 6.9 points, 3.2 rebounds and 1.9 blocks while starting eight of 14 games — the most during his Husky career — last season.
“I came back to play the game I love … and it’s an opportunity to give back to this school that has given me so much,” said the 24-year-old Kepnang, who participated in Senior Day activities last season and has a year of eligibility remaining. “I know I can give more and show more than I have. Personally, I want to play 30 games because that’s something I haven’t done in a long time.
“I told coach he was going to get the best version of me, a version he hadn’t seen before. … That’s what I’ve been focused on. It was those days in the weight room when it was just me and Zoom. That’s where it started, and now it’s kind of funny to look back and think about those times and how we got here.”
Admittedly, they put their faith in Sprinkle, who said, “I’m going to bring in the best players to turn this around.”
The first to join was four-star prep recruit JJ Mandaquit, who signed with the Huskies last November, enrolled at UW in the spring and participated with Diallo and Kepnang in offseason workouts.
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Soon after, Sprinkle replenished the roster with seven transfers starting with Rutgers’ Lathan Sommerville (April 3), East Tennessee State’s Quimari Peterson (April 5), Lipscomb’s Jacob Ognacevic (April 9), USC’s Wesley Yates III (April 16), Indiana’s Bryson Tucker (April 21), Florida State’s Christian Nitu (May 22) and USC’s Desmond Claude (June 10).
“To be honest, I hear like everybody else, on the internet,” Diallo said when asked if he’s involved in the recruiting process. “You go on your phone, and boom. There’s a commitment.”
Some acquisitions like Claude and Tucker were a surprise to Diallo while others made sense, including Yates, who began his collegiate career at UW and redshirted the 2023-24 season due to a foot injury.
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“Slowly the roster came together, and I started to get more excited,” Diallo said. “I started looking at the background of guys and where they came from. I’m like, ‘OK, we can all play together.’”
With the addition of freshmen Hannes Steinbach, Jasir Rencher, Courtland Muldrew, junior-college transfer Mady Traore and international prospect Nikola Dzepina, who is scheduled to arrive in December, the Huskies head into Monday’s 8 p.m. season opener against Arkansas-Pine Bluff at Alaska Airlines Arena with renewed enthusiasm.
“You’re always excited at the start of the season,” Kepnang said. “Everybody is 0-0 and feeling good, probably tired of (training camp) and ready to get the season started. This year is no different. I’m excited because I know we can do big things this year.”
For the first time in recent memory, the Huskies are preseason favorites to receive an NCAA tournament berth, which would snap a seven-year drought.
ESPN, which projects 11 Big Ten teams in the Big Dance, tabs UW as a No. 11 seed slated for a First Four game.
Washington was picked 11th in the Big Ten preseason poll and ranks No. 45 in KenPom, which is its highest rating since 2011.
“I like that people are saying nice things about us and that expectations are high because they certainly couldn’t get any lower after the season we had,” Sprinkle said smiling at Big Ten Media Day. “But at the end of the day, everything that people are saying and writing doesn’t mean much if we don’t go out there and do the things to be successful.
“And that’s not coach speak, that’s just the facts. … Yeah, we might be better on paper. But so what? Maybe we upgraded the talent and things like that. But are we going to box out, play defense, sacrifice for each other and do the little things to win? That’s what I want to know.”
They’ve been together a relatively short time, but the returning Huskies say Sprinkle, who starts his second year at Washington, has changed after a season of turmoil ended with a six-game losing streak.
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“His eagerness and determination is at a 10 because he knows he recruited the right group of guys,” Diallo said. “And that’s not taking anything away from last year’s group of guys. Let me put that out there. Last year was what it was.
“This year, (Sprinkle) is just very detailed about the little things, and he’s so determined to just turn this around.”
For the first time in his career, Sprinkle’s coaching reputation took a hit after standout stints at Utah State (28-7) and Montana State (81-43), which included three NCAA tournament appearances and three conference championships.
“He has a different edge that’s understandable and rightfully so,” Kepnang said. “He’s always been one of the nicest persons to be around. He’s going to mess with you, joke with you and you can tell him anything.
“But more than anything, I would say he’s honest. He won’t just tell you what you want to hear, but what you need to know. As a player, there’s nothing better in a coach.”
Percy Allen: pallen@seattletimes .com. Percy Allen is a sports reporter for The Seattle Times, where he writes about the University of Washington Huskies men’s and women’s basketball teams and the Seattle Storm.