A visit home keeps Cooper Flagg grounded
Cooper Flagg, wearing a pair of Meta glasses, dribbles against a camper during a game of 2-on-2 with his brothers at the Flagg Brothers Basketball Procamp on Saturday at the University of Maine in Orono. Ace Flagg is at left. (Russ Dillingham/Staff Photographer)
ORONO — Cooper Flagg is trying his best to remain just a kid from rural Maine. But kids from rural Maine were never the first pick in the NBA draft. They were never the NBA Rookie of the Year. They certainly never won “Celebrity Family Feud.”
Everything Flagg has done so far in his young professional basketball career with the Dallas Mavericks isn’t just new to him, it’s new to us. His life is a Maine-shaped fishbowl, and everyone from Kittery to Fort Kent is watching it unfold.
That’s why hosting a basketball camp with his brothers, Ace and Hunter, at the University of Maine has become a summer tradition for Flagg. It’s a reminder of where he’s from, a totem of the support he has back home as he blazes his NBA trail.
“It’s great to be home. It’s very private, very low key. It’s good. It’s time that I cherish, for sure,” Flagg said to the media assembled Saturday afternoon in the New Balance Field House.
On Friday, a selfie Flagg took with some fans outside a Mexican restaurant in Newport this week made the social media rounds. Even in his hometown, is Flagg able to get quiet time with friends and family? Can he go out for some tacos and conversation, something the rest of us take for granted, without it becoming an impromptu autograph show?
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“I do pretty normal things and try to keep it low key,” he said.
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Dusty May has been the head coach of the Dallas Mavericks for only about two months, after guiding Michigan to the NCAA championship. He’s learning a lot about his team on the fly, but May knows one thing: Cooper Flagg is his franchise, and if the franchise invites you to Maine to check out his basketball camp, you make the trip.
Supporting Flagg at this camp and seeing how comfortable his star player is at home is important to building a relationship, May said. The humility he’s seen from Flagg as he interacts with the campers is nothing new, May said.
“The one thing about relationships, they grow organically. So we just try to spend time together and be together and get to know him. Not rush anything. We have a lot of time,” May said. “The better I understand who he is as a person, the better I’ll be able to coach him. Also, it’s always comforting to see where people are from and what their background is. All those things just help you understand people a little bit better.”
This week, we saw two examples of how Flagg’s profile continues to rise. Wednesday at Delta Dental Park at Hadlock Field, some fans waited in line all day for one of the 1,000 Flagg bobbleheads given out by the Portland Sea Dogs before a game against the Binghamton Rumble Ponies. Many more fans waited and learned they arrived just a little too late to get the instant collectors item. Within hours, some of the bobbleheads were available on eBay or Facebook Marketplace for hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars.
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Earlier in the week, a one-of-a-kind Flagg trading card, autographed by Flagg and containing a patch worn on his jersey in his NBA debut, was found in Rhode Island. The card could fetch millions at auction.
“It’s fun to see that type of stuff. Obviously, I got a couple bobbleheads. The signed debut patch (card) is pretty cool. It’s a lot of fun,” Flagg said.
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Maybe living a life in which his time is not always his own anymore has made Flagg a little guarded, a little stoic. If being home was a chance to let his guard down, Flagg didn’t take it, not with the local media. Say the wrong thing, or be perceived to have said the wrong thing, and it will be around the world five times before you can clarify or apologize. So Flagg answered most questions quickly, keeping any deep insight to himself.
Cooper Flagg answers questons from reporters during the Flagg Brothers Basketball Procamp Saturday at the University of Maine in Orono. Flagg was named the NBA Rookie of the Year after the 2025-26 season. (Russ Dillingham/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
Still, things happen at home that don’t happen anywhere else. Like being roasted by your twin brother, for instance. When asked what the brothers would offer to each other as coaches, Cooper’s initial response was to say he’s not sure.
Ace was quick to pounce. These opportunities don’t come along every day, and entering his sophomore season with the University of Maine men’s basketball team, Ace was playing on his home court. The alley-oop pass was there, Ace just had to dunk it.
“Maybe toughen up a little,” he said, getting a laugh from the media and a smile from his brother.
In that moment, Cooper Flagg wasn’t the face of the Dallas Mavericks, or the reigning NBA Rookie of the Year. He just a kid from Maine again, which was exactly what he wanted.
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Tagged: cooper flagg, Sports Columns, travis lazarczyk
Travis Lazarczyk has covered sports for the Portland Press Herald since 2021. A Vermont native, he graduated from the University of Maine in 1995 with a BA in English. After a few years working as a sports. More by Travis Lazarczyk
