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Freshman superstar Darryn Peterson had one of the more confounding college basketball seasons you’ll ever seen in his one and only season with the Kansas Jayhawks.
On one hand, Peterson was an elite two-way guard when on the court, putting him the conversation for the No. 1 pick in the 2026 NBA Draft. On the other, Peterson missed multiple games and had to be pulled early from others due to a medical issue that plagued him throughout the season.
Prior to the NCAA Tournament, Peterson revealed that he dealt with extreme cramping, highlighted by a harrowing preseason incident.
“I had like a full-body [cramp], super serious,” Peterson said. ”You could say it was traumatic. I would say it was a traumatic experience.”
Peterson explained that the incident first occurred in September during the program’s annual boot camp and that he had to go to the hospital to receive IV fluids at one point.
“The previous week, we had boot camp where we were just running, no basketball,” he expanded. “The previous week caught up to me, and my body just locked up on me, I guess.”
Darryn Peterson Blames Creatine Intake For Extreme Cramping Issues
In a recent interview with Ramona Shelburne of ESPN, Peterson delved further into the issues, revealing that he feared he was dying when they first popped up, and blaming high doses of creatine, a legal, naturally occuring supplement that helps send energy to muscles, as the cause.
“I’d never taken it before [he got to college],” Peterson said of the popular supplement which helps to increase muscle strength, power and growth. “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 increased levels, Peterson claims, caused full-body cramps that made him fear that he was dying.
“I made it to the training room and just started begging them to call 911,” he said. “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.”
Darryn Peterson May Have Misunderstood His Diagnosis
However, his explanation doesn’t check out with everyone.
For real though, I’m not aware of any evidence that creatine would cause such severe body cramps you need hospitalized
Unless you have an underlying health issue as is that predisposes you to electrolyte/hydrstion/muscle breakdown issues
— Brian Sutterer MD (@BrianSuttererMD) May 8, 2026
“I’m not aware of any evidence that creatine would cause such severe body cramps you need hospitalized,” sports medicine doctor Brian Sutterer posted on X.
Sutterer then theorized that Peterson may have confused creatine with creatine kinase, an enzyme that is released into the blood when muscles break down and is often associated with rhabdomylysis, a potentially life-threatening syndrome caused by rapid muscle breakdown that releases toxic cell contents into the bloodstream that can cause kidney failure.
Without knowing his medical history, we don’t know for sure what happened to Peterson. But it sure sounds like more than just increased creatine intake?