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Texas Tech basketball offers 5-star 2021 forward Moussa Diabate and others

By Matthew Conner

MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA - APRIL 08: Head coach Chris Beard of the Texas Tech Red Raiders looks on against the Virginia Cavaliers in the first half during the 2019 NCAA men's Final Four National Championship game at U.S. Bank Stadium on April 08, 2019 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images)
MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA - APRIL 08: Head coach Chris Beard of the Texas Tech Red Raiders looks on against the Virginia Cavaliers in the first half during the 2019 NCAA men's Final Four National Championship game at U.S. Bank Stadium on April 08, 2019 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images) /
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The Texas Tech basketball program continues to chase big fish after extending an offer to 2021 5-star forward Moussa Diabate and other top high school prospects in the nation.

Now that the 2019 Texas Tech basketball roster appears set, Chris Beard and his staff are turning their attention to the future.  And they are pursuing some of the biggest prospects in the county in their attempts to keep Red Raider hoops competitive at the highest levels of the game.

And it appears that Beard is not only looking to the class of 2020, he’s actively trying to build the class of 2021 two years before these high school juniors are set to even arrive on campus.  As we have discussed before, the Red Raiders are already in the mix for the No. 3 player in the class Jonathan Kuminga, whose brother Joel Ntwambe recently transferred to Tech from UNLV.

Now, Beard has extended an offer to the No. 8 player in the class of 2021, Moussa Diabate, according to Andrew Slater of The Athletic.  Rated a 5-star prospect by 247Sports.com, the 6-foot-9, 180-pound forward is playing his high school ball in  Daytona Beach, FL.  The native of France boasts an impressive offer list which includes schools like Louisville, Illinois, Florida, Memphis, Miami, Georgia Tech, UNLV and Virginia Tech.

https://twitter.com/Andrew__Slater/status/1140006730094579723

And that list is guaranteed to grow exponentially.  After being named a MaxPreps.com freshman honorable mention All-American honoree in 2018, he put up 11.1 points per game for the French under-18 team in seven games last summer and he is preparing to represent his home country again in 2019.

Another 2021 prospect to land an offer from the Red Raiders is Ben Gregg from Oregon.  The 6-foot-8 forward is currently unrated by 247Sports.com but he is one of the more coveted prospects in the Northwest.  And not surprisingly, he considers Gonzaga his dream school but that isn’t keeping the Red Raiders from throwing their hat in the ring.

Yet another high school junior to report an offer from Tech is Langston Love, a shooting guard from Cibolo, TX.  The 6-foot-4 prospect is unrated by 247Sports but is a 4-star target according to Rivals.com.  He already holds offers from Houston, Oklahoma, Baylor, Stanford, Texas, Texas A&M and UCLA.

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Speaking of Rivals.com, their national basketball analyst Corey Evans reports that Tech has also offered 4-star guard Will McClendon from Las Vegas, Nevada.  The 6-foot-4, 190-pounder is a top-30 player in his class according to Rivals and currently has offers from TCU, Ole Miss, Washington, UNLV, New Mexico and Fresno State.

But Beard is not overlooking the class of 2020 either.  According to Ami Unman, a high school basketball writer, Tech has offered 2020 prospect Jonathan Aku.

The 6-foot-10, 4-star prospect from Lewisville, Texas is the No. 122 overall player in the nation and the No. 8 player in Texas according to 247Sports.  He also has offers from a host of schools including Baylor, Texas A&M, Houston, LSU, TCU, Miami and Virginia Tech.

Certainly, these offers to some of the highest-rated players in the nation underscore the fact that the Red Raiders are recruiting at a level like never before in program history.  After landing the No. 16 class in the nation in 2019 thanks to three top-140 players (Jahmius Ramsey, Terence Shannon and Tyreek Smith), it now appears like Beard is ready to turn that trick again.

There was a time not long ago when the Red Raiders would be lucky to sign multiple 3-star players in one class, much less a handful of four or five-star prospects.  For instance, just six years ago in 2013, Tech signed the worst class in the conference (No. 99 overall) which featured just one 3-star prospect (Alex Foster), three 2-star players and one unranked signee.

Again in 2015 and 2016, the Red Raiders landed the lowest-rated classes in the Big 12.  In 2015, all four of Tech’s signees were low 3-star prospects while in 2016, the Raiders added only two players, 3-star guard Shadell Millinghaus and an un-rated JUCO guard named Niem Stevenson.

And even the 2014 class, which featured Keenan Evans, Norense Odiase, Zach Smith and Justin Gray was rated just the No. 7 class in the Big 12 and the No. 74 class in the nation.  But despite the fact that there were no 4-star players in that class either, those four players were the foundation of the 2017-18 team that reached the Elite 8 proving that recruiting rankings aren’t all that matters.

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However, for Tech to stay near the top of the sport, Beard is going to have to continue to bring in players capable of competing for national titles because there simply aren’t too many 3-star players capable of turning into first round NBA Draft picks like Zhaire Smith and Jarrett Culver.  And though he has come tantalizingly close to winning it all with rosters of mid-level recruits that have exceeded expectations, perhaps landing some of the most talented players in the nation is going to be what puts Beard’s program over the top.

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