{"id":665705,"date":"2026-03-18T22:40:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T22:40:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/665705\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T22:40:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T22:40:14","slug":"espns-jeremy-woo-reveals-where-darius-acuff-stands-in-2026-nba-draft-ahead-of-ncaa-tournament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/665705\/","title":{"rendered":"ESPN’s Jeremy Woo reveals where Darius Acuff stands in 2026 NBA Draft ahead of NCAA Tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"

For all the talk of the loaded freshman class in college basketball, exactly how NBA teams view them has not been revealed. Plenty of debate takes place from the outside. A recent popular name rising in the ranks is Arkansas<\/a> guard Darius Acuff<\/a>. Putting together a show in the backend of the season, Acuff might hear his name called quite early.<\/p>\n

ESPN\u2019s Jeremy Woo<\/a> believes Acuff is in contention to be a top-five selection \u2014 No. 5, to be exact. Woo says the top four appear to be set in stone, with certain NBA teams liking more than others. But Acuff is joining the group and can improve his stock in the upcoming NCAA Tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we\u2019re looking at the possibility of Acuff sneaking into the top five,\u201d Woo said on SportsCenter. \u201cI think, talking to people around the NBA, people feel pretty comfortable with the top four of (AJ) Dybantsa<\/a>, (Darryn) Peterson<\/a>, Cam Boozer<\/a>, and Caleb Wilson<\/a> in some order. But Acuff is knocking on that door, he is breaking into that group. Starting to separate a little bit.<\/p>\n

\u201cKingston Flemings<\/a>, Keeton Wagler<\/a>, two other very good freshman guards. But Acuff has really answered the call this season. He\u2019s so strong and so quick. In big moments, he\u2019s been there\u2026 He\u2019s a star, he\u2019s got starpower. That\u2019s what you\u2019re looking for in the top five.\u201d<\/p>\n

Acuff has been highly thought of for quite some time. The\u00a0Rivals Industry Rankings<\/a>\u00a0slotted him as the No. 9 overall player in the\u00a02025 cycle<\/a>\u00a0out of\u00a0IMG Academy<\/a>. Arkansas knew they had a special player coming to Fayetteville and saw results right away. But the last few weeks, beginning with a 49-point performance against\u00a0Alabama<\/a>, are when Acuff has really begun to take off on the national scale.<\/p>\n

Performing well in the NCAA Tournament can raise your profile by a significant amount, though. To an extent, Acuff did so in Nashville last week in the SEC Tournament. He averaged 30.3 points and helped the Razorbacks cut down the nets. Many even believe Acuff could turn out to be the best guard to ever play for John Calipari<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Arkansas takes the court on Thursday afternoon, going up against Hawaii<\/a>. If chalk were to hold, a second-round matchup vs. Wisconsin<\/a> would take place. Woo circled the potential game as one to watch for Acuff, going up against a backcourt filled with a ton of experience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For all the talk of the loaded freshman class in college basketball, exactly how NBA teams view them…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665706,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,73892,6,12],"class_list":{"0":"post-665705","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba-draft","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-darius-acuff-25-img-academy","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-nba-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116252588656812607","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}