Kings not worried about straying from identity with Darius Acuff Jr. pick originally appeared on NBC Sports Bay Area
SACRAMENTO – Four hours after the Kings selected Darius Acuff Jr. with the No. 7 pick in the 2026 NBA Draft, Sacramento media members sat patiently inside the press conference room awaiting general manager Scott Perry.
Just around 10 p.m. PT Tuesday, Perry entered the room and took a seat. Relieved. Presumably exhausted. And with a big grin on his face.
The patience in the room reflected the patience of the fan base of a team that has made one playoff appearance in 20 years. But the Kings’ hope, judging by Perry’s enthusiasm Tuesday, is that it will all be worth the wait.
Between Acuff Jr. and Perry, the word “excited” might’ve been uttered more than 20 times since their union was made official. It’s a relationship that existed before Tuesday, as Perry coached Acuff Jr.’s dad back in the 1990s, and one that’s sure to blossom in the future.
“He told me he’s a great guy,” Acuff Jr. said Tuesday on a Zoom call with reporters when asked what his dad told him about Perry. “He’s going to show love. He’s always going to show love no matter what, but he’s going to keep it real no matter what. That’s how Scott is. Ever since I met him, he’s been showing love and keeping it real.
“So I love everything about that whole organization, everybody on the staff, so I’m just excited to get there.”
Acuff Jr., like Perry, is from Detroit, a place he’s credited multiple times for shaping him into the player and person he is today.
While the world got to witness what Acuff Jr. can do on the court in his one historic season at Arkansas, in which he averaged 23.5 points and shot 44 percent from 3-point range on six attempts per game, with 6.4 assists and 3.1 rebounds, it was about Acuff Jr.’s character off the court that also was overly important to Perry and his staff.
“He’s been raised very well to be a very respectful young man, and that’s important to me,” Perry said. “I happen to have a little bit of familiarity with some of his upbringing, because I happen to know his father a little bit and some of his uncles and people back in Detroit. But he treats people with respect off the court, which is extremely important to us. I want our guys not only to aspire and work hard to be great basketball players, but I want them to be great citizens in the community, and I think he has an opportunity to do that.
“He’s a young man, he’s going to be growing, but he’s a willing listener, he wants to be good both on and off the court. So those were attractive to us.”
Another trait that caught Perry’s eye while watching Acuff Jr. over the years is his competitiveness, surely a welcome attribute for a team that lost 60 games last season.
“He’s highly competitive,” Perry said. “One thing that stands out about Darius is that when he walks into a room, he believes he’s going to be the best player in that gym, best player on that floor. He has a very quiet confidence, not an arrogance, but a very quiet confidence. So that’s very attractive about him.
“One thing that me, our staff, we look for is guys that are coming out of winning programs, because we think they understand what it means to sacrifice, what it means to play with other good players to accomplish the singular goal, and that’s the goal of winning. So big step for us tonight in terms of us ultimately reaching our goals.”
Acuff Jr. led a point guard gauntlet in this draft class, with other players such as Kingston Flemings, Mikel Brown Jr. and Keaton Wagler also in that mix.
Perry shared that in his 26 years around the NBA, this was one of the “deeper drafts” he’s been a part of, adding that there was no shortage of “high-quality” point guards to choose from. Ultimately, it came down to the Kings’ decision-makers viewing Acuff Jr. as the “best point guard fit for us.”
“He’s a tremendous competitor, and I watched what he did with that Arkansas team this year. I was fortunate enough to actually watch him a couple years ago out of USA Basketball when I was not working in the league. I spoke to a young group that had all the top prospects out there, and just the way he went about his business then, even at a younger age. [He’d] back down for no one.
He has a lot of skills, he’s a player that can score at all three levels, he can get to the basket, he can score in the mid range, he can obviously shoot the three-point shot very effectively, and he can get teammates involved. He’s a very good passer, and so that’s what you look for in a point guard. So he exhibited all those skills, so we’re very comfortable in showing that.”
But Perry couldn’t ignore the elephant in the room.
Since taking over as general manager a year ago, he and coach Doug Christie have repeated, reiterated and reinforced the importance of defense and trying to build an identity around that. Last season, when reporters would ask Christie about the team’s lackluster offense, he would cut them off and say something along the lines of: “Don’t ask me about offense” or “We’re focused on defense.”
It became crystal clear: Defense. Defense. Defense.
Until it wasn’t.
Drafting Acuff Jr. doesn’t necessarily scream “defense” or strengthen that identity the Kings supposedly are trying to build.
There was absolutely no question or concern about what Acuff Jr. can do with the ball in his hands, but defense is his obvious flaw. So how can Perry make sense of the pick when they have been so adamant about establishing this defensive identity?
“Look, I’m a former college coach for 13 years, and when you have a high usage guy like that on offense, sometimes he’s not going to always be one of the best [defenders]. But he’s more than capable of defending. When you get a young man like this who’s highly competitive, who wants to be successful, he will figure out how to defend well enough at this level. So I’m pretty confident in that.
“Most of the guys that are getting drafted at the top of the draft all have to get better defensively. You got to learn this league. So that’s something that I’m very comfortable and confident that he will be able to do.”
Plus, Perry believes playing for a defense-minded coach such as Christie can only help Acuff Jr. on that end of the floor.
Perry knows overcoming any defensive doubt falls solely on Acuff Jr., but he’s sure the 19-year-old not only will rise to the challenge but will be excited to prove the naysayers wrong.
“Look, obviously, he’s been a great player to this point. Now, he has to come to the professional role to prove himself all over here, but he has a burden to die to want to be the best he can be,” Perry said. “He will figure that out. He will be a young man who will accept coaching, who will accept criticism. As a matter of fact, he embraces that. And I think if you all reach out to [Arkansas] coach John Calipari, he would tell you that about Darius.
“So, yeah, I’m excited to see his relationship grow with Doug and the rest of the coaching staff. I have no doubts that Darius will embrace that. Will he have bumps along the way? Absolutely. You can’t point to a rookie that’s ever played in this league that didn’t have tough patches, tough stretches, and have some nights that things didn’t go their way, or they struggled, but what you look for is the zillion personalities, and I believe he has that.”
Perry refrained from answering the final question of the press conference about how Acuff Jr. can elevate the Kings now and in the future, instead stating that he’ll let Acuff Jr. answer that with his play come October.
Acuff Jr., too, is ready to get the ball rolling and just start hooping again. Kings fans, passionate and patient Kings fans, can’t wait for that, either. And while the hope is that this 19-year-old will be the spark that ignites several beams in the future, Acuff Jr. isn’t overwhelmed by the pressure that could come with that.
“It’s never pressure. You just got to go out there and hoop,” he said. “I’m not too wired about pressure or none of that. I’m just going out there and playing my game. I’m looking to improve each and every game. It’s a long season, an 82- game season. So I’m just looking forward to going out there and getting better.”
