Five-star freshmen dazzle in Razorbacks' exhibition win over Cincinnati
The No. 14 Arkansas basketball team put the college basketball landscape on notice Friday with an 89-61 bludgeoning of the Cincinnati Bearcats on Friday, and they were led by the duo of five-star phenom guards Darius Acuff Jr. and Meleek Thomas.
Of course, the game was meaningless in the grand scheme of the entire season, but it was the first bit of live action against competition that wasn’t their own team.
The two combined for a total of 36 points (18 for Thomas and 17 for Acuff) on 14-of-23 shooting. Thomas was also the team’s leading rebounder with seven boards and Acuff dished out four assists.
“They think highly of themselves,” head coach John Calipari said postgame. “The only thing I’m telling both of them, ‘You’re going to take a lot of shots. You can’t take bad ones. That’s disrespectful to your teammates. They know you’re going to shoot a lot of balls, but you’re not going to shoot one-foot step back because it’s in your trick bag. No, you’re not taking that one. The other ones are all good. Take them.’”
Acuff’s strong performance starts in the lane
Shot selection was, overall, pretty good for not just Thomas and Acuff but the entire team. But Calipari said he’d like to see Acuff drive to the hole more instead of settling for three-point shots.
When he did get to the rim, Acuff found a lot of success. In fact, he scored 10 points in a little over four minutes in the first half, and he threw down a dunk in the second half that got the crowd on its feet.
“He did that little stepback and missed it,” Calipari said. “Then he started getting to the rim, shoulder, how about he dunked one? You know what I said? Really hard to be cool when you make a dunk like that. It just wipes out your coolness. I’m not cool, I’m just going to dunk this on somebody. He’s really talented, really smart. But you know, he’s young. He’s going to make mistakes, do certain things.”
Acuff didn’t put up a ton of shots from deep, just four in the game, but he did connect on two. He’s at his best when he breaks down a defender and gets to the hole, which allows him to find open teammates as he finished with four assists.
One big question heading into the season was how Acuff would handle an off-ball role. He and junior guard D.J. Wagner haven’t played together a lot, but Acuff said he feels the role he’s in is natural.
“High school, of course I was a good scorer, so my coach at both schools put me in good positions to score off the ball,” Acuff said. “I feel like it’s kind of natural to go on and off the ball. I don’t really have a problem. We tell each other all the time any one of us can bring it up. It doesn’t really matter. We get out fast.”
Meleek Thomas shows full bag of tricks
Thomas’ shotmaking ability makes him a threat to score anywhere he touches the ball on the floor. He started the second half with a pair of threes, and showed the full bag of tricks several times throughout the game.
As good as that is to have on your team, Calipari said he needs to learn that less is more.
“They can’t believe Meleek Thomas is playing the way he’s playing,” Calipari said. “Which is no 12 bounces, spin, spin, step, boop, aye, doot. They’re like, ‘Geez, I didn’t see any of those.’ He’s just playing basketball, hard cuts. If he’s open, he’s flying up and down the court.”
Arkansas forward Trevon Brazile said the team is not surprised in the least by Thomas’ abilities on the floor.
“I mean, we’ve been seeing it the whole summer,” Brazile said postgame. “He’s not shy when it comes to shooting the ball, and he makes them. So we’re going to keep trusting him to shoot them and make them. We believe in him when he shoots it. He’s probably our best shooter.”
Acuff said after the game he’s known about Thomas’ shooting since back in high school, when the two were five-stars.
“I’ve been seeing it since high school,” Acuff sad. “Like [Brazile] said, you’re our best shooter. He shoots a high clip every day, and if he missed four in a row, he’s going to shoot four again. So he’s not shy doing that. I’m glad everybody got to see it tonight.”
It’s fair to expect Thomas and Acuff to play a heavy dose of minutes, but Calipari said they have to learn that those minutes are earned, not given.
“They both have to learn that this isn’t a pickup game where I’m just going to start shooting and not throw it to anybody, just come down and take an NBA three for no reason,” Calipari said. “What? ‘You’re not doing that. You took the most shots already, why would you shoot that?’ So that’s stuff they have to learn. But they’ve been good. They’ve been good.”
The Razorbacks will hit the road to play the Memphis Tigers at the FedEx Forum on Monday ahead of the start of the regular season against Southern on Nov. 3.
