NORTHRIDGE – Freshman forward Lamine Diane averaged a double-double en route to earning his second Big West Player of the Week award this season, the league office announced on Monday. Diane helped CSUN Men’s Basketball win two of three games this past week including the Las Vegas Classic Upper Division title. For the week, Diane averaged 23.3 points, 10.0 rebounds, 1.7 blocks and 1.3 steals per game. He also shot over 53 percent from the field in the three games.

Currently in the Top 20 in the nation in points and rebounds per game, Diane is the only freshman to average a double-double this season and one of two players to average over 24 points and 10 rebounds. The dynamic freshman from Senegal is posting 24.3 points and 10.2 rebounds this season, which ranks eighth and 16th in the nation respectively. He has also made the third-most field goals (121) and posted the 14th-most double-doubles (6).

Diane would help lead the Matadors to a pair of gritty wins at the Las Vegas Classic this past weekend over SIUE (85-79) and Rider (81-80) to earn tournament MVP honors.

He racked up a double-double of 21 points and 11 rebounds to go with four assists, three blocks and three steals against SIUE on Saturday. The win was the Matadors’ first in a neutral-site game since beating Wright State in 2015, snapping a seven-game skid.

A day later, Diane nearly registered another double-double as he collected 24 points and nine rebounds in 36 minutes before fouling out against Rider. Freshman Darius Brown II would hit two free throws in the final seconds to push CSUN to the one-point win. Named MVP for the tournament, Diane shot 20-of-40 from the field in the two games in Las Vegas and tallied 45 points and 20 rebounds.

Diane began the week with a 25-point, 10-rebound effort at New Mexico State. Despite a 92-57 setback, Diane went 10-of-16 from the field and picked up two blocked shots.

Diane leads the Big West in a host of categories this season including points per game, rebounds per game, defensive rebounds per game (7.0), and blocks per game (2.2). He is shooting 49.8 percent from the field in 33.9 minutes.

The Matadors return to action on Saturday evening as they host Morgan State on The Blacktop atThe Matadome at 7:00 p.m.