Winners/losers from the first weekend of the NCAA tournament include John Calipari, Darryn Peterson Big Ten and Kentucky.

Among the big winners are the Big Ten and John Calipari, who guided Arkansas to its second Sweet 16 in his second season as head coach. Meanwhile, Kentucky heads home.

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As for future lottery pick Darryn Peterson, he didn’t exactly make the final impression in Kansas that NBA executives were hoping to see. Let’s take a look at the biggest winners and losers from the first two rounds of the tournament:

Winner: John Calipari

John Calipari’s departure from Kentucky marked a seismic shift in the college basketball landscape.

The game’s winningest program parted ways with one of the most successful coaches of his era, who opened a pipeline of elite talent to Lexington and led the Wildcats to a national championship.

But a prolonged lack of tournament success, which included a nine-year Final Four drought, made the relationship unsustainable. And the two parted ways after a first-round exit in the 2024 NCAA tournament.

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Two years passed and Calipari made the break. Calipari took some of his talents to his new job with SEC rival Arkansas and led the Razorbacks to the Sweet 16 in year one. Now you have Arkansas back in the Sweet 16 with a star point guard in Darius Acuff Jr. leading the way as arguably the tournament’s best player after two games.

Acuff, a future NBA lottery pick with top-5 upside who was named first-team All-America as a freshman, is turning scorched earth in tournaments. In wins over Hawaii and High Point, Acuff averaged 30 points, 6.5 assists and 1 steal per game. He’s shooting 49% from the field and 5 of 11 (45.5%) from 3. He’s the type of talent Kentucky came to take for granted during Calipari’s reign.

Now it’s in Arkansas for the second weekend of the tournament. And Kentucky went home after a listless second-round loss to Iowa State that will have head coach Mark Pope in the hot seat as he begins his third season as coach of his alma mater.

-Jason Owens

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Loser: Darryn Peterson

Presumptive lottery pick Darryn Peterson entered the tournament with a chance to solidify his place atop NBA Draft boards and answer the questions that have dogged him during his freshman campaign at Kansas.

With Kansas’ disappointing loss to St. John’s in the second round, the questions surrounding Peterson remain intact, and his spot atop the draft is anything but certain.

Peterson’s tournament was a microcosm of his turbulent regular season at Kansas. In the first round, he scored 10 straight points and showed off his prowess as an elite 3-level scorer as Kansas opened up a 26-point lead against Cal Baptist.

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But when Cal Bapist cut that lead to 6 points late in the second half, Peterson disappeared down the stretch. He hit a floater with 5:43 left for his 28th point and didn’t score again. In fact, he barely participated in KU’s offense and didn’t touch the ball on repeated trips down the court as Cal Baptist cut its deficit from 66-52 to 66-60 in the final minutes.

Kansas survived the upset and hosted Sunday’s game against St. John’s. Peterson once again led the JayHawks with 21 points. But there were times in the game when he wasn’t involved in KU’s offense. And then came the final play, where Peterson, a strong defender, didn’t help when Dylan Darling broke through the Kansas defense virtually unopposed for a game-winning layup at the buzzer.