Weight on Darius Acuff Jr.'s shoulders is nothing new

[ad_1] Darius Acuff Jr. strode into the media room inside Bridgestone Enviornment Sunday after being named the SEC Match MVP and main Arkansas to an 86-75 victory over Vanderbilt within the SEC Championship Recreation with a majority of the web that the Razorbacks had minimize down hanging round his neck.

It was an ideal metaphor for the freshman guard from Detroit, who's the X-factor for the Hogs and their hopes of bringing a nationwide championship to Fayetteville for the primary time since 1994.

Sure, Arkansas is led by legendary head coach John Calipari. They function one other gifted freshman guard in Meleek Thomas, an skilled backcourt with seniors Malique Ewin, Trevon Brazile and Nick Pringle, a beloved "glue man" in Billy Richmond III and an elite facilitator in junior guard DJ Wagner.

Nevertheless it's Acuff who makes Arkansas a scary matchup for anybody who performs them in March.

Jay Bilas weighs in on Darius Acuff Jr. Arkansas' SEC Match opponents already discovered how good Acuff is in postseason play.

After successful the SEC Participant of the Yr award and being named the SEC Freshman of the Yr, Acuff scored 37 factors, together with a pivotal nook jumper to place Arkansas up by 4 late, within the Razorbacks' quarterfinal overcome Oklahoma on March 13.

A scrappy Ole Miss squad restricted him to simply 4 factors within the first half of Arkansas' semi-final bout with the Rebels on March 14 earlier than he scored 20 within the second half en path to a 93-90 extra time win.

And on the largest stage he'd performed on in his basketball profession in Sunday's SEC title recreation, Acuff scored 30, together with back-to-back threes to finish the primary half, the previous of which had the Vanderbilt bench in shock.

"Simply my teammates believing in me, I give credit score to them," Acuff stated Sunday when requested about his sturdy trio of performances in Nashville. "They belief me with the ball, and I simply gotta go make the performs."

Acuff scored the third-most factors by a single participant in SEC Match historical past per HogStats.com, and essentially the most factors by a participant within the SEC Match amongst those that performed simply three video games.

Acuff additionally had 13 rebounds and 23 assists over Arkansas' three video games within the SEC Match to enhance his scoring prowess.

That is why ESPN's Jay Bilas, who known as Sunday's SEC title recreation and noticed Acuff's heroics up shut, named him because the defining issue within the Razorbacks making an NCAA Match run.

"Arkansas freshman Darius Acuff Jr. is the kind of participant who can carry a staff to a Closing 4," Bilas wrote whereas predicting that four-seed Arkansas would win its Spherical of 64 matchup over 13-seed Hawaii on Thursday.

Ought to Arkansas beat Hawaii and five-seed Wisconsin beat 12-seed Excessive Level, a second-round matchup between the Hogs and Badgers could be on faucet.

Bilas' prediction for that potential contest was skewed in the direction of Wisconsin till the ultimate sentence.

"The Razorbacks have Darius Acuff Jr., and no person else does," Bilas wrote, predicting that Arkansas would transfer on to the Candy 16 to face one-seed Arizona.

There won't be a greater technique to summarize Arkansas' potential for a March Insanity run than that.

William Shakespeare as soon as wrote that "all of the world's a stage, and all of the women and men merely gamers." On the stage of faculty basketball, there are few brighter stars and higher gamers than Acuff, who has the potential to turn into an NCAA Match legend starting on Thursday.