Hornets’ Moussa Diabaté named 2025-26 Kia NBA Hustle Award winner

Charlotte Hornets forward Moussa Diabaté has been named the winner of the 2025-26 Kia NBA Hustle Award, the league announced on Thursday.

The Kia NBA Hustle Award honors players who make effort plays that do not often appear in the traditional box score but impact winning on a nightly basis. The award is based on a statistical formula rather than a media vote, utilizing a variety of hustle stats.

Hustle stats – including deflections, loose balls recovered, charges drawn, screen assists, contested shots and box outs – have been tracked by the NBA since the 2016 Playoffs and can be viewed on an individual and team level at NBA.com/Stats.

Moussa Diabaté’s Hustle Stats and Rankings

Note: Rankings are among the 124 eligible players who played a minimum of 58 games (70% of a team’s 82 total games) and at least 24 minutes per game. Hustle stats are measured on a per-minute basis to standardize comparisons among players who play varying minutes.

Charlotte made a dramatic in-season turnaround during the 2025-26 campaign. Through Dec. 22, the Hornets were 9-20 (24th in win percentage in the NBA). From Dec. 23 through the end of the season, the Hornets went 35-18, the sixth-best winning percentage in the NBA during that span.

What sparked that change? Dec. 23 marked the day Diabaté became a full-time starter for Charlotte. Diabaté thrived in his role as a hustle player in that unit, complementing fellow starters LaMelo Ball, Kon Knueppel, Miles Bridges and Brandon Miller.

• He set hard-hitting screens to free up Charlotte’s prolific 3-point shooters, ranking fourth in screen assists per minute (0.1122) and seventh per game (2.9). Driven by his activity, the Hornets ranked fifth in points per possession off screens (1.07) this season.

• He boxed out and crashed the offensive glass to give the Hornets extra possessions, leading all players in offensive box outs per minute (0.0537) and tying for first per game (1.4). He finished fifth in offensive rebounds per game (3.7), helping Charlotte rank second in second-chance points per game (17.8).

• He had a nose for chasing down 50-50 balls on offense, ranking eighth in loose balls recovered per minute (0.0147). Those extra efforts provided the Hornets additional opportunities to score and prevented opposing teams from getting out in transition.

• He contested shots from all over the court, ranking 10th in contested 2-point shots per minute (0.2001) and 11th in contested 3-point shots per minute (0.0958). Diabaté’s ability to defend multiple positions — he split his time between defending guards (21.1%), forwards (35.4%) and centers (43.5%) — helped Charlotte become a top-five defense once he became a full-time starter.

Diabaté put up career-best numbers across the board in his fourth NBA season — 7.9 points on 63.1% shooting, 8.7 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 1.0 blocks and 0.8 steals in 26.0 minutes per game. His 20 double-doubles nearly tripled his previous career total.

But those numbers do not fully capture Diabaté’s impact each night. His combination of energy, effort, selflessness, grit and hustle made him a pivotal piece of the Hornets’ 25-win improvement from last season and a key pillar of their foundation for the future.

2025-26 NBA Hustle Award Top Five Finishers

Kia NBA Hustle Award Winners