ESPN’s Jay Bilas talks former KU guard Darryn Peterson, others in deep NBA Draft
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- Bilas says Peterson, Dybantsa and Boozer are worthy of the No. 1 pick this year.
- Bilas says Peterson is the most talented player despite illness and cramping.
- Round One of the 2026 NBA Draft will begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday from Barclays Center.
ESPN college basketball analyst Jay Bilas sees no clear-cut favorite for the overall No. 1 pick in the 2026 NBA Draft.
The hoops expert shared that and other pre-draft thoughts during a Thursday conference call with media. The draft is next week in Brooklyn, New York.
“You have three guys in my view that are worthy of the No. 1 pick this year,” Bilas said. “(Darryn) Peterson is the most talented player. (AJ) Dybantsa looks like he was built in a lab to play in the NBA and (Cameron) Boozer is the best pure basketball player. The analytics say you take Boozer.”
Round 1 is set to begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Barclays Center. It will be aired on ABC and ESPN. Round 2 is slated to follow Wednesday at 7 p.m. on ESPN.
“Really, it’s going to be fascinating the decisions that are made,” Bilas said, “and I don’t know that we’ll get the ‘why’ when they’re made, but I think it’s going to be fascinating to watch.”
The general managers of the top three teams (Washington, Utah and Memphis) have tough calls ahead as they likely wind up with either Kansas’ Peterson, BYU’s Dybantsa or Duke’s Boozer in picks 1 through 3.
North Carolina’s Caleb Wilson is a strong candidate to be taken by Chicago at No. 4.
“This draft has a lot of really interesting decisions that are going to be made because there are so many really good players,” Bilas said. “I’m sure this will be no different than any other draft I’ve been a part of on the broadcast side, in that we’ll look back in five years and we would have done it differently.
“That’s probably going to hold true in this one, too.”
Apparently, Peterson has a strong desire to be selected No. 1 overall by the Washington Wizards. In fact ESPN’s Shams Charania reported recently that Peterson has visited the Wizards’ training facility but was not planning on making any other trips for meetings with team personnel.
CBS Sports noted that Peterson did meet with Utah’s front-office officials at the NBA Draft Combine. CBS sources, however, said he stayed in Washington for “an extensive visit, spanning multiple days and more than one on-court workout.”
“He’s the real deal talent-wise,” Bilas said of Peterson. “ Had he played a full season without this cramping thing and the ankle, and then he had one game where he had the flu, and since Michael Jordan had the flu game, if you don’t play through the flu, somehow, you’re not a competitor. I don’t buy that for one second. I can’t get out of bed when I have the flu.
“But that created some question marks in people’s minds, myself included, and there’s just this nagging little thing in the back of your mind when you’re evaluating going, ‘We didn’t see what we thought we’d see,’ and still he averaged 20 a game,” Bilas explained.
“He shot a really good percentage from 3 (38.2% en route to 20.2 ppg). He had moments, unbelievable moments like at halftime in the game against BYU. Was there any question who was the best player on the floor? It was him.”
Peterson scored 18 points in the first half of that game. But because of leg cramps, he asked off the floor with 16 minutes to play and did not return as KU beat BYU 90-82.
Peterson missed 11 games in 2026-27 because of illness or cramping and asked out of several other contests. But the point guard/shooting guard from Canton, Ohio played more than 30 minutes in eight of KU’s final nine games.
“When he wasn’t able to, when his body wouldn’t let him play in the second half, what player who is on his way to a 35-, 40-point game says, ‘I’ve done enough?’ I don’t believe that happened,” Bilas said.
“My thing is, if you think he’s the best player or the best prospect, you think he’s the most talented and you take him at No. 2, so you wouldn’t take him at 1 if you’d take him at 2? If you think AJ Dybantsa or Boozer is better — that’s to me why this draft is so fascinating.”
Bilas said Peterson was the obvious No. 1 player in the high school recruiting class of 2025.
“And there was zero indication that, no questions about his competitiveness, his want-to, any of it. None of it,” Bilas said.
“Now, he’s a very soft-spoken young man, and this is my view, and I don’t expect people to share this, but in the absence of perfect information, people are going to speculate, especially people in our business. I don’t think the speculation that occurred in the media and surrounding his situation was helpful to people’s perceptions and helpful to people’s view of him.
“I sat down with him at the Combine for an interview (in May) and got to hear him explain what he went through. When you hear in September he had a full body cramp that required them calling 911 and hospitalization, you could understand that maybe when this crops up from time to time, there’s something to say, ‘Hey, let’s make sure there are doctors there,’ and Kansas had doctors and all that stuff.
“I just don’t believe that he was tapping out. Because how would you explain the last eight, 10 games where he played 32 minutes a game? It’s just something where his body wouldn’t let him do it, and maybe we could argue about, were they too cautious in this game or that game or whatever? Reasonable minds can certainly have that discussion.”
Asked which point guard he’d take first on Tuesday, Bilas said: “If you consider Peterson a point guard (and he’s indicated he wants to play point in the NBA), then Peterson would be No. 1. I think the first guard sort of after that initial group ... I have Darius Acuff Jr. next.
“Acuff is ridiculous. He’s this powerful, compact, lengthy. He’s not that big, he might be 6-2, but it’s like trying to guard a bowling ball going downhill. He is ridiculously strong and powerful and athletic, great finisher. He can make off-balance body control shots under pressure. He’s got range. He led the SEC in scoring and assists, which hasn’t been done since Pete Maravich was at LSU. That’s a minute ago. And there have been some good players in that league.
“So, he’s special,” Bilas continued. “And the way he finished the season like the SEC tournament and the NCAA Tournament, he was (darn) near unstoppable. I think it was Fran Fraschilla and Seth Greenberg, both of them, did but I don’t know which one of them said it first, but they compared him to Damian Lillard. I think there are some differences, obviously, but I thought that was a fair comparison. I think it shows how talented he is.”
Of players not named Peterson, Dybantsa and Boozer, Bilas said: “The top three or four … whether it’s Caleb Wilson from North Carolina, he’s probably the most dynamic athlete in the draft. Darius Acuff could wind up leading the NBA in scoring. Not his first year, but you could certainly see that happening.
“Like when Kevin Durant came out in 2007, that was one of the things you said about him was he could wind up leading the league in scoring. There are so many good players in this draft. Mikel Brown, Jr., from Louisville could wind up being the best guard coming out of the draft. He’s talented enough that you could say that. Nobody knows, but you certainly have certain beliefs about it.
“Because of the level of talent, you’re going to have guys who are going to be drafted further down that are going to be great, and then you may have some guys that don’t live up to what observers expect.”
Bilas added: “When Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was taken 11th or 12th in his draft year, how many of us were raising our hands going, ‘There’s a two-time future MVP?’ I don’t know who was saying that. But there’s certainly that possibility, if not probability, that we’re going to have a situation like that where you have a player further down this draft that turns into a first-team all-NBA performer, and the trick is finding that player.
“The more I’ve been involved in this, the more respect I have for the decision-makers in the draft process, because it is not easy.”
This story was originally published June 18, 2026 at 7:41 PM with the headline "ESPN’s Jay Bilas talks former KU guard Darryn Peterson, others in deep NBA Draft."
