Cooper Flagg faced national attention and sky-high expectations even before he played a single high school basketball game in Newport, Maine.
That pressure and scrutiny will enter another phase this week as Flagg sees his first professional action in the NBA Summer League. Flagg and the rest of the Dallas Mavericks summer league roster will take on Bronny James and the Los Angeles Lakers at 8 p.m. Thursday.
Flagg’s NBA debut will be broadcast nationally on ESPN. But don’t expect the bright lights to suddenly rattle the 18-year-old forward.
From high school championships to a dominant freshman year in college, Flagg has not only met the astronomical expectations following him for years, but risen beyond them in spectacular fashion. And he has looked comfortable every step of the way.
Opposing NBA players will certainly try to welcome Flagg to the league by making things difficult for him on the court. And even Flagg’s new coach wants to try to make him uncomfortable as he joins the Mavericks.
“I want to put him at the point guard,” Dallas coach Jason Kidd said at Flagg’s introductory press conference with the team. “I want to make him uncomfortable and see how he reacts.”
Kidd said he is “excited to give [Flagg] the ball against the Lakers and see what happens” in that June 27 press conference. “Let’s get it started right off the bat.”
Flagg is certainly no stranger to that sort of point-forward position where he combines the size of a post player with the facilitating abilities of a point guard. And while the competition in the NBA is guaranteed to be at another level, Flagg’s track record leaves little doubt that the heralded rookie is ready to make the jump — and have the ball in his hands.
“As I’ve said time and time again, Cooper is going to be prepared to make an impact right away,” Flagg’s longtime player development coach, Matt MacKenzie, told the BDN after the first day of the June 2025-26 NBA draft. “I think that his ability to adapt to certain situations and figure out how he can be most impactful is what makes him so great.”
MacKenzie owns Eastern Maine Sports Academy and Results Basketball in Veazie. He had been with Flagg out in Los Angeles prior to both the draft combine and draft as Flagg trained in preparation for the NBA.
“I expect him to understand pretty quickly what he needs to do and how his role will begin, and then how it may evolve over the course of the season,” MacKenzie added.
Flagg also looked comfortable at the introductory Mavs press conference with Kidd and team General Manager Nico Harrison at his side.
“I’m coming in just trying to learn and trying to get better every single day,” Flagg said. “And I think if I can do that to the best of my ability, I think expectations and pressures that other people will put on me and our team, that will kind of work itself out.”
He’ll have quite the group of veteran teammates to learn from, with the Dallas roster already including NBA champions like Kyrie Irving, Anthony Davis and Klay Thompson III.
“He’s very lucky to have veterans, future Hall of Famers,” Kidd said. “When you talk about Ky and Klay and then AD, just understanding the vets are going to protect him and help him. And they’re going to push him.”
Those veterans won’t be playing Thursday night against the Lakers, with summer league action typically featuring NBA rookies, second year players and members of the developmental G League squads. That means Davis won’t be playing against his former Los Angeles team, which dealt him to Dallas in the blockbuster deal earlier this year involving former Mavericks star Luka Doncic.
Doncic similarly won’t be on the court for the summer league matchup against his former team. The sting felt by many Dallas fans after that shocking trade may have subsided somewhat after the team’s stunning draft lottery luck that allowed them to land Flagg, along with the calls from some to fire Harrison.
Harrison and the Mavericks front office are understandably excited to welcome Flagg to Dallas after a tumultuous and ultimately disappointing season that followed a trip to the NBA finals the year before.
“When people talk about him, they don’t talk about basketball with him,” Harrison told The Athletic’s Christian Clark about Flagg. “They talk about all the intangibles. When you have a player who’s that good and they talk about the intangibles, that’s a guy who’s going to add to your culture.”
The on-the-court work to add to that culture will begin with Thursday’s summer league game against the Lakers, which will be played at the Thomas & Mack Center at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
