photo by: Nick Krug

Lawrence High's Ebrahim Diagne chases down a ball with Shawnee Mission Northwest's Wyatt Gunter during the first half on Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2015.

When people watch Lawrence High’s boys soccer team, eyes usually gravitate to Ebrahim Diagne.

The talented senior is a playmaker who keeps teammates and fans excited about what he will do next. He has plenty of speed, plus the finesse to dribble between defenders. When he finds an opening, he’s not afraid to fire away at the net.

Diagne ranked second in the Sunflower League last year with 10 goals and earned first-team all-league honors.

And yet, the Lions expect a much bigger encore out of him this fall.

Lawrence coach Mike Murphy plans to put Diagne at attacking midfielder this season, giving him a chance to touch the ball more and create opportunities for attackers Cain Scott, Hosam Aldamen and Quentin Harrington.

“We haven’t had that in probably three years here, a guy with that kind of talent in the midfield who can create for us,” Murphy said. “That’s definitely exciting.”

It took Diagne a few weeks to adjust to the varsity level last season. The Lions went scoreless in their first four games, finishing with a 4-12-1 record.

But Diagne was one of the biggest bright spots in the team’s offense, and he is hopeful that he can pick up where he left off — he scored all 10 goals in the team’s final 12 games.

His biggest strength is his unpredictability with the ball. He’s Picasso with a blank canvas.

“Most people have their tendencies,” LHS senior Charlie Carr said. “They do this and that on the team, and I know what they are going to do so I can usually stop them. With him, I never know what he’s going to do. He might try something crazy. He’s too creative.”

Of course, it wasn’t always as easy as Diagne makes it look now.

After moving from Senegal to Lawrence for the start of his sophomore year, Diagne had to adjust to a language barrier. Trying to play soccer without communication is essentially running around the field wearing a blindfold.

Diagne was born in New York City but moved to Senegal when he was four years old. Growing up he learned French in school and only spoke basic English — essentially “Hi, how are you?” he said.

On the soccer field, it was a crash course of learning a new language.

“I come here, I couldn’t speak to anyone,” Diagne said. “I was just laughing at anything they would say. Sometimes I could understand what they were saying, but I couldn’t respond. Then my accent, it’s hard for them to understand me. For like three months, I couldn’t do it.”

Really, the only thing Diagne could do was play with his instincts and make sounds when he wanted the ball.

“I didn’t know any names because everyone looked the same,” Diagne said with a laugh. “It was crazy. I thought everyone’s name was Cole. So I was just making sounds to communicate.”

In addition to learning how to talk to his teammates, there were many more adjustments. He never had to run so much in practices in his life, plus it took time to adapt to the heat. In Senegal, he was used to temperatures around 70 degrees all year long.

So Diagne spent his entire sophomore season at the junior-varsity level. Murphy said it was by design after he coached a foreign exchange student from Germany and noticed he wasn’t playing at full speed until becoming more comfortable with communicating to teammates.

“The one thing about Ebra, which I thought he picked up pretty quickly, was he’s very intuitive,” Murphy said. “His movement and stuff was pretty natural. … His whole first year, we tried to let him be real comfortable, build that confidence.”

After Diagne surprised himself with last year’s scoring outburst, the biggest question is how much can he improve?

For the first time, Diagne played with a club soccer team in the offseason, playing alongside two LHS teammates. He said he usually went six months without playing. He didn’t play last summer because he traveled back to Senegal.

With more practice, Diagne is much more comfortable on and off the field. His coaches have noticed he plays the game at a faster level and he makes better movements without the ball.

“The coach taught me a lot that I didn’t know,” Diagne said of his club team. “He made me more comfortable with the ball, and I got to work with my partners Charlie and Cain. We understand each other more when we play together.”

Diagne laughed and smiled when he started thinking ahead to next season.

For his teammates, they’ve enjoyed watching his progress from the kid who had trouble communicating to the athlete — and person — that he is today.

“I think the main thing that soccer has done for him here is it’s helped him learn the language and make friends,” Carr said. “He would definitely not be the same person without being a part of the high school team and our club team this spring.”