Cooper Flagg’s Rise Continues: A Teenage Force Taking Over the NBA
DALLAS - Before Cooper Flagg was lighting up NBA scoreboards, before the Rookie of the Month honors started piling up, before he was even old enough to drive, he was already turning heads in some of the most competitive pickup runs in New England.
Matt MacKenzie, a basketball trainer from Maine, wanted to see what his 14-year-old protégé was really made of. So he called up Brian Scalabrine - former NBA vet and the gatekeeper of a notoriously tough Boston pickup scene filled with current and future Division I talent - and asked if Flagg could get a run.
Scalabrine agreed. Flagg didn’t just hold his own. He dominated.
“That’s when I made the phone call to USA Basketball,” Scalabrine recalled. “Made the phone call to (Duke coach) Jon Scheyer.
I had kind of heard of him but didn’t know enough. From there, he just took off.”
Fast forward to now - Flagg is 19, and he’s still dominating. Only now, it’s on the NBA stage.
On Tuesday night in Dallas, Flagg dropped 36 points, grabbed nine boards, and handed out six assists against the Celtics. It was his third straight 30-point game, and while the Mavericks came up short 110-100, Flagg’s performance was anything but a footnote.
His recent scoring tear - 119 points over the last three games - is the most by a teenager in NBA history over that span. That stat alone tells you how rare this kind of production is. But for those who’ve watched Flagg’s journey closely, it’s not shocking.
“He’s the same kid,” Scalabrine said. “Just doing it at a higher level.
His ability to play through contact? That’s been there since he was 14.”
Flagg is averaging 20.1 points, 6.7 rebounds, and 4.2 assists in his rookie season - numbers that would be impressive for any first-year player, let alone one who’s still technically a teenager. On Tuesday afternoon, he was named Western Conference Rookie of the Month for the third time in a row. That’s not just consistency - that’s dominance.
Scalabrine sees shades of another phenom in Flagg’s game: LeBron James.
“To me, that’s his comparable,” Scalabrine said. “The ability to highly process the game, make the right reads.
The game looks easy for him because of his mind. He’s a great athlete.
Gets to where he wants to go, gets to his spots.”
That mental edge - the ability to slow the game down and make the right play - is what separates the good from the great. And Flagg, even at 19, is playing with the poise of a seasoned vet.
Tuesday’s matchup had extra meaning for Flagg. Growing up in Maine, he was raised in a Celtics household.
His mom, Kelly, a former Division I player at the University of Maine, was a die-hard Boston fan who used to show him old footage of Larry Bird and the Celtics of the 1980s. That competitive fire Bird played with?
Flagg’s been trying to channel that since day one.
“Doing everything out there,” Flagg said before the game. “Even sometimes the stuff that people don’t want to do. The little stuff.”
That mindset is showing up all over the floor. Flagg’s motor hasn’t slowed, even with the Mavericks struggling this season and missing key stars like Kyrie Irving and Anthony Davis for long stretches. He’s still diving for loose balls, crashing the glass, and flying in for chase-down blocks.
One of those came in the third quarter Tuesday, when he sprinted back after a turnover and pinned Baylor Scheierman’s layup attempt against the backboard. It was a reminder that Flagg isn’t just a scorer - he’s a two-way problem for opponents.
“He has a savage side to him, which is good,” Scalabrine said. “He can talk trash to people but keep his composure.”
That blend of edge and control is rare. And it’s part of what’s made Flagg’s rise feel so inevitable. In the five years since that first pickup game, he’s become the top-ranked high school prospect in the country, reclassified to enter college early, won the Naismith College Player of the Year at Duke, and went No. 1 overall in the NBA Draft.
None of it has fazed him.
“Never overwhelmed by any of this,” Scalabrine said. “He has a great team around him of people who have brought him to this level.
And obviously, he’s a generational talent. It’s a good combination - a really good combination.”
Cooper Flagg isn’t just living up to the hype. He’s redefining what’s possible for a teenager in the NBA. And if this is just the beginning, the league better buckle up.