John Calipari pays visits to 5-stars Darius Acuff, Jayden Quaintance

John Calipari has been a busy man this week. The Kentucky men’s basketball head coach has been all over the recruiting trail lately, making multiple visits to go see five-star class of 2024 point guard Boogie Fland in recent days. Calipari even conducted an in-home visit with the top-ranked floor general on Tuesday.

But Fland isn’t the only target in Calipari’s crosshairs. On Wednesday, he paid visits to a pair of five-star recruits: five-star ’25 point guard Darius Acuff and five-star ’24 center Jayden Quaintance. Andrew Slater was first to report the news on Acuff while Travis Graf had the news on Quaintance first. Both prospects hold offers from Kentucky and are considered two of the staff’s top overall targets.

Calipari is getting in front of these recruitments, making Acuff and Quaintance priorities. The two high-level prospects also expect to visit UK next month — Acuff for Big Blue Madness (Oct. 13) and Quaintance a week later, both being official visits. Acuff is ranked No. 9 overall in the class of 2025 while Quaintance is No. 12 overall in the class of 2024, per the On3 Industry Rankings.

Kentucky HC John Calipari &
Kansas are in for ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ PG Darius Acuff’25 @DariusAcuff of @IMGABasketball & @TheFamily_bball 🥊🥊 pic.twitter.com/uqmYWfH2ee

— 𝒜𝓃𝒹𝓇ℯ𝓌 𝒮𝓁𝒶𝓉ℯ𝓇 (@Andrew__Slater) September 20, 2023

https://t.co/cv8lKh6p47 pic.twitter.com/eyU0DaU2BK

— Travis Graf (@TravisGrafHoops) September 20, 2023

With Acuff, there haven’t been many with a bigger rankings leap than him this year. He went from relatively unknown at the beginning of the spring to a bonafide five-star recruit by the end of the summer. Kentucky sent an offer to the IMG Academy (FL) product in April and has been in constant talks ever since.

“It’s just a family,” he told KSR in July. “They build a great relationship with you and great guards come from there. It’s a great school. Coach Chin (Coleman) is telling me to just keep going, get better, stay in the gym, and lead your team.”

Playing up a year on the Nike EYBL circuit for The Family this summer, Acuff was a top-five scorer among all 17U participants. He averaged 20.1 points per game on 43.6% shooting, 35.9% from three, and 82.4% at the line while adding 3.9 rebounds and 3.8 assists in 28.8 minutes per contest. The Detroit, MI native officially visited Michigan earlier this month. UK is his only other known OV at this time.

As for Quaintance, the 6-foot-10 big man reclassified from 2025 to 2024 back in July, about a month after he took an unofficial visit to Lexington, which is when the Wildcats extended him an offer. Cincinnati, Ohio State (officially visited last week), Missouri (officially visiting starting today), and Washington are also high on his list.

“I went on an unofficial when I got the offer. It was definitely cool to talk to Coach Cal for like 30 minutes,” he told KSR in July. “Me, my dad and my little brother were all talking to him and we got to see a practice. It was cool to be down there. They seem interested and it seems like a good fit. So we’ll see.”

Suiting up for Word of God Christian Academy at Overtime Elite, Quaintance averaged 17.3 points and 11.6 rebounds per contest this past season. He then shined with Team USA at the FIBA U16 Americas Championship. Since he didn’t turn 16 until this past July, he’ll have to spend at least two years in college before he can enter the 2026 NBA Draft.

Kentucky currently has just one commit in the 2024 cycle (four-star center Somto Cyril) and none from 2025, but Caliapri and the staff are working hard to change that.