{"id":857970,"date":"2025-06-25T16:11:48","date_gmt":"2025-06-25T21:11:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/25\/cooper-flagg-set-to-become-mavericks-new-main-man-as-the-expected-no-1-pick-in-nba-draft\/"},"modified":"2025-06-25T16:11:48","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T21:11:48","slug":"cooper-flagg-set-to-become-mavericks-new-main-man-as-the-expected-no-1-pick-in-nba-draft","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/2025\/06\/25\/cooper-flagg-set-to-become-mavericks-new-main-man-as-the-expected-no-1-pick-in-nba-draft\/","title":{"rendered":"Cooper Flagg set to become Mavericks' new main man as the expected No. 1 pick in NBA draft"},"content":{"rendered":"

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FILE – Duke forward Cooper Flagg celebrates after scoring against the Houston during the second half in the national semifinals at the Final Four of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo\/Brynn Anderson, File)<\/p>\n

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NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Cooper Flagg and his Duke teammates were together celebrating a victory over North Carolina the night of Feb. 1 when one of them saw the news that had rocked the basketball world.<\/p>\n

The Dallas Mavericks were trading Luka Doncic<\/a> to the Los Angeles Lakers.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe just all started going crazy,\u201d Flagg said Tuesday. \u201cIt was such a shock. Like, it was craziness.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now Flagg is set to take Doncic’s place as the franchise superstar in Dallas.<\/p>\n

Flagg is expected to be selected by the Mavericks with the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft on Wednesday night after a sensational one-season stopover with the Blue Devils.<\/p>\n

Everybody but Flagg seems certain he is the Mavs’ man \u2014 \u201cI haven\u2019t had that conversation at all,\u201d he insisted \u2014 and there’s really no reason for the team to look otherwise. Flagg was the consensus college player of the year<\/a>, only the fourth freshman to win the Wooden Award after averaging 19.2 points and 7.5 rebounds while leading Duke to the Final Four.<\/p>\n

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A little more than a month later, the Mavericks turned just a 1.8% chance into a lottery victory<\/a>, giving them the right to pick first for the second time in franchise history. They brought Flagg in for what he felt was a good workout that lasted more than an hour, though he said they never said he would be their pick.<\/p>\n

He’s surely one of the few who might believe there’s reason to wait until Commissioner Adam Silver announces the selection at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, my whole family is in Dallas and they\u2019re stoked to be able to go to Mavs games and watch Cooper. He\u2019s part of the family,\u201d said UConn forward Liam McNeeley, Flagg’s teammate at Montverde Academy in Montverde, Florida.<\/p>\n

Flagg’s selection would return the NBA draft to the way it was for so long, with a one-and-done college player starting it. A freshman went first for 13 straight years from 2010-22 before the last two No. 1 picks<\/a>, Victor Wembanyama and Zaccharie Risacher, were both from France.<\/p>\n

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The No. 2 pick could be Wembanyama’s teammate, as the Spurs are set to draft at No. 2. Philadelphia, Charlotte and Utah round out the top five, with NBA champion Oklahoma City holding two first-round selections and the Brooklyn Nets owning four.<\/p>\n

It’s already been a busy NBA offseason, with Kevin Durant<\/a> and Jrue Holiday<\/a> being traded. It’s unlikely the Mavericks would consider trading the rights to Flagg, especially not after the uproar from their fans when they dealt away the beloved Doncic.<\/p>\n

The No. 3 pick in 2018 from Slovenia led the Mavericks to the 2024 NBA Finals and had become a perennial All-Star and MVP candidate. Flagg said he’s not concerned about the pressure that would come with stepping into Doncic’s shoes.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t look at anything as pressure,\u201d Flagg said. \u201cI think me going into whatever situation I go into, I\u2019m just going to try to be myself all the time and I\u2019m going push myself to be better and better every single day and make the most out of every day. I\u2019m not worried about living up to certain players\u2019 expectations or things like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Flagg has already shown he isn’t afraid of a challenge. He could have still been in high school last season, but decided to reclassify so he could enter college, and subsequently the NBA, a year earlier.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think a quote my mom likes to say a lot, if you\u2019re the best player in the gym than you need to find a new gym,\u201d he said in explaining that decision. “So for me, it was thinking about what I had left to do in high school, how much that would push me to become a better player.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt it was time for me to kind of get to a new environment and push myself to higher levels.\u201d<\/p>\n

On Wednesday, he reaches the highest one in basketball.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP NBA: https:\/\/apnews.com\/nba<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read More<\/a> BRIAN MAHONEY<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Basketball FILE – Duke forward Cooper Flagg celebrates after scoring against the Houston during the second half in the national semifinals at the Final Four of the NCAA college basketball tournament, Saturday, April 5, 2025, in San Antonio. (AP Photo\/Brynn Anderson, File) (ASSOCIATED PRESS) NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Cooper Flagg and his Duke teammates were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":857971,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[124942,3681,3958,126379],"tags":[16302],"class_list":["post-857970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","category-basketball","category-cooper","category-flagg","tag-nba"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=857970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/857970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/857971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=857970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=857970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsycanuse.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=857970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}