Meleek Thomas on Arkansas next season: ‘We could win a national championship’
By SAM LANCE
McDonald’s All-American and Arkansas signee Meleek Thomas is setting the bar high for the Razorbacks next season.
“I think we could win a national championship,” Thomas said at McDonald’s All-American media day.
After starting 0-5 in SEC play, Arkansas battled down the stretch of the 2024-25 season to get back on the right side of the NCAA Tournament bubble. Once in the field, John Calipari’s squad made some noise and were a few plays away from an Elite Eight appearance. However, Arkansas ultimately fell to Texas Tech in overtime, 85-83, during the Sweet Sixteen.
“It was amazing to watch Arkansas just go through their whole journey and see what they do offensively, defensively, because we going to be in that system next year,” Thomas said. “So just to get used to that from a visual standpoint.”
Thomas, a top-10 recruit, is only half of what should be an electric Arkansas backcourt next season. The top point guard in the class and No. 5 overall prospect, Darius Acuff Jr., has also signed with the Razorbacks and is participating in the McDonald’s All-American game with Thomas. Arkansas has the No. 6 overall recruiting class per 247Sports with those two, plus four-star guard Isaiah Sealy.
“I’ve been knowing [Thomas],” Acuff said. “We saw how other guards don’t really have the same mentality as us. So we were just talking about, even when [Calipari] was back at Kentucky we were still talking about [teaming up]. But really once he got to Arkansas, we kind of still came together and said ‘let’s do something.’ We feel like no other guards really want to guard us to be honest. So we came together on that.”
Usually, two elite guard talents from the same class don’t end up on the same team. But Acuff and Thomas are an exception.
“We both score at a high level, both distribute the ball at a high level,” Thomas said. “And like Darius said, there’s not too many players in the country that want to guard us. And there’s not too many players in the country that want to win at the level we want to. Usually two very good scoring guards or players that are ball dominant want to get far away from each other and be in their own situation. But in my opinion, if you have two real dogs, how you going to lose when you’re on the same thinking path?”
The two talented guards will be playing against each other during the McDonald’s All-American game on Tuesday night. Acuff is representing the east while Thomas is on the west team. Tipoff is set for 9 p.m. ET from the Barclays Center.
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