The cramps overtook Darryn Peterson, making the potential No. 1 pick in June’s NBA draft fear for his life.
After enduring Kansas coach Bill Self’s weeklong workouts last September, something went horribly wrong and Peterson had to be taken to a hospital in an ambulance.
“I made it to the training room and just started begging them to call 911,” he told ESPN. “They were trying to get a vein to get me the IV, get me back hydrated. But I was cramping so hard they couldn’t get a vein.
“I thought I was going to die on the training table that day.”
The cramping issues permeated his lone season in Lawrence, a sometimes brilliant campaign plagued by cramping and others injuries that forced him to miss games or leave contest early.
Now, with the draft lottery two days away that will determine which team potentially selects him No. 1 overall come June 24, Peterson has an explanation for the mysterious cramps.
Peterson revealed to ESPN that bloodwork and testing revealed that taking high doses of creatine affected him in adverse ways.
Creatine is used to boost workouts and recovery, among other goals, according to my.clevelandclinic.org.
“I’d never taken it before [college],” Peterson told the outlet. “But after the season I took two weeks off and they did tests which showed my baseline level was already high.
“So, they said when I dosed (a process of increasing a dose over time to create maximum benefit at the beginning of taking a supplement), it must’ve made the levels unsafe.”
The upcoming draft seems to have a set top three featuring Peterson, BYU’s AJ Dybantsa and Duke’s Cameron Boozer, with most pundits expecting Peterson or Dybantsa to be picked first.
Peterson is an all-world talent, averaging 20.2 points and 4.2 rebounds, but there seemingly are more questions about him than the others due to the odd circumstances that limited him to 24 games in Lawrence.
Several games featured Peterson’s minutes having to be managed, and neither Peterson nor Self divulged much about the mysterious absences.
Peterson detailed to ESPN how that September incident scarred him, explaining that doctors believed at the time they had been experiencing dehydration.
He felt sore for a few days after and worried that he could experience a similar reaction
“Whenever I felt anything like that come on, my initial thought was that it might get to that again,” Peterson told ESPN. “And I can’t let that happen and be embarrassed and have that on TV and all that.
“It kind of put me in a tizzy because I didn’t know what was causing it. Nothing’s ever been wrong with me before. Basketball is my life. What I love to do. But something was going on and I couldn’t figure it out.”
One of Peterson’s most scrutinized exits for cramping came during a highly publicized game against Dybantsa and BYU due to cramping after just 20 minutes in a 90-82 home win on Jan. 31.
In hindsight, he’s not sure if he handled the seaosn-long situation in the right way.
“My biggest thing was I’m going to keep trying because we don’t know what’s wrong and we can’t say something’s wrong,” he told ESPN. “So, I’m going to go out there and when it happens, I’m going to ask to come out. I don’t know if that was a right or wrong move.
“But when I committed to Kansas, I told coach (Self), ‘I’m going to do whatever I can. I’m going to try to help you get a championship. I’m going to be out there for my teammates and for you guys.’ So, I tried to hold up my end of the deal, trying to be out there.”
Peterson did not have any issues toward the end of the season, routinely playing 30-plus minutes including 36 in a loss to St. John’s in the second round of NCAA Tournament.
He told ESPN he mostly tried to keep details to himself due to a lack of an explanation, although he appreciated that his teammates attempted to defend him.
Peterson’s father, Daryl, reportedly kept telling him they would “get to the last laugh whenever it is,” while his mother, Natatia, took it harder.
“She was like, ‘I always had an angel for you your whole life, but right now I just don’t know what to do,'” Peterson told ESPN, adding that she cried once since they couldn’t figure out how to help him.
“There were definitely times I wanted to quit and when the world was against me, but they had my back and it was just great to have somebody lean on.”
Peterson told the outlet he’s stopped taking “a creatine supplement” in his training for the NBA Combine, and is feeling more like himself now that he knows why he had such a bumpy year.
He’s hoping whichever team drafts him — the Wizards, Pacers and Nets have the top odds for the No. 1 pick, in that respective order — uses him more as a point guard than Kansas did.
“I was off [the ball] most of the year, but some of that was me not really being myself,” Peterson told ESPN. “So, coach was trying to figure out ways to help me still be effective without exerting too much. As the point guard you got to bring it up, you got to do everything.
“I’ve been thinking about how differently things could have been [at Kansas] if I didn’t get hurt or have all this stuff going on. When I was out there, I felt like I still did all right. But there was another level of me that people didn’t get to see.”
