Mavericks select Duke's Flagg with first overall pick in 2025 NBA Draft
Published
The Dallas Mavericks have selected Cooper Flagg with the first overall pick in the 2025 NBA Draft on Wednesday night.
Flagg, a 6-foot-9 forward, had been widely considered to be the top prospect in this year’s draft class since graduating from high school a year early to enroll at Duke as a 17-year-old.
In his lone season in Durham, Flagg, alongside fellow 2025 draft prospects Khaman Maluach and Kon Knueppel, led the Blue Devils to a 35-4 record and their first appearance in the Final Four since Mike Krzyzewski retired in 2022.
The Newport, ME native averaged 19.2 points, 7.5 rebounds, 4.2 assists, and 1.4 blocks in 37 games en route to winning the Naismith Award as the national player of the year and the Wooden Award as the most outstanding male player in college basketball.
Flagg’s selection marks just the second time in Mavericks franchise history that the team has drafted first overall after taking Mark Agguire out of DePaul University in 1981, one year after the franchise’s inception.
Dallas had just a 1.8 per cent chance of winning the draft lottery and jumped up 10 spots to tie the largest move up the board by any team in league history.
Following February’s blockbuster in which the Mavs sent franchise pillar Luka Doncic to the Los Angeles Lakers, the team now begins a new chapter with Flagg as their centrepiece alongside Anthony Davis, who headlined the return in the Doncic deal, and Kyrie Irving, who has reportedly agreed to a new three-year, $119 million deal to remain with the team.
Dallas played to a 39-43 record in an injury-riddled 2024-25 season, finishing as the tenth seed in the Western Conference before falling to the Memphis Grizzlies in the play-in tournament.