Kansas basketball recruiting target narrows list to final eight schools

The Kansas Jayhawks put together a strong 2024 recruiting class, landing 5-star center Flory Bidunga and 4-star wing Rakease Passmore. While both players are expected to contribute at a high level to the program, head coach Bill Self has his sights set on a 2025 recruit who would be one of the best recruits in KU history.

Incoming high school senior Darryn Peterson recently trimmed his college list to eight schools. He will be choosing between Washington, Ohio State, Louisville, Kentucky, Kansas State, Arizona State, and SUC, but the Jayhawk faithful believe Lawrence, Kansas, is where he wants to call home.

Darryn Peterson includes Kansas basketball in top eight list

As expected, Peterson listed the Jayhawks in his top eight. All signs point to him considering KU among his top schools — he became the first high school athlete to sign an NIL deal with Adidas last year and took an official visit to Lawrence in June.

The news comes one week after point guard recruit Darius Acuff committed to John Calipari and the Arkansas Razorbacks. It is possible that those two recruitments were tied to each other for KU. Not to say that Self and Co. were adamant about passing on a top-10 recruit, but there could have been a conflict of interest between the two parties regarding who would be KU’s big freshman star.

Peterson attends Huntington Prep in West Virginia, the same high school former Jayhawk Andrew Wiggins graduated from. Like Wiggins, Peterson is arguably the top player in his class and has serious potential to be selected in the NBA Draft lottery in the summer of 2026.

Here is a scouting report from Adam Finkelstein of 247 Sports that highlights Peterson’s strengths on the court:

"Darryn Peterson possesses a combination size, length, strength and skill which allows him to smoothly score and make plays for himself and others. He's a versatile threat, who can operate from multiple spots on the floor, and has a way of making it look effortless in the process. He can play both on and off the ball, has a very good pull-up game, is a consistent shooting threat off the catch from behind the three-point line, and also willing to bring smaller guards into the low post. Peterson sees the floor well and can facilitate for those around him, and also has an advanced understanding of how to get himself to the free-throw line."

- 247 Sports' Adam Finkelstein

We will continue to update Peterson's recruitment as the process moves along, but the chances of him being a Jayhawk seem fairly high right now.