A hobbled Cooper Flagg was determined to celebrate top-ranked Duke’s latest Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament title by snipping a piece of the net, even after missing two straight games.
So he crossed a sea of scattered confetti and began climbing a ladder, with fans, teammates and media members closely watching as he took the first step up on his sprained left ankle.
“Be careful, brotha!” a voice implored amid the din. “Be careful, up and down.”
As Flagg descended with keepsake in hand, he bypassed the ladder’s lowest step and touched down on that same left foot, offering a momentary awkward gait.
“Just don’t hurt yourself getting off the ladder, please,” another voice said.
Sure, it was a small — and maybe a little nervously tense — moment, but it captured a slice of the gaze that has been locked on Flagg all season. The biggest star in the NCAA Tournament is a freshman who didn’t turn 18 until nearly two months into the season and went on to be an unanimous media first-team All-American. Yet his presumed lone March Madness run as a potential No. 1 overall NBA draft pick begins with him nursing that ankle injury and the East Region’s top seed facing a bit of late-season tumult, only magnifying the attention on Flagg’s every step, dribble or potential grimace.
“Man, Cooper’s handled every single thing that’s been thrown at him with grace,” graduate guard Sion James said after Duke’s home finale against Wake Forest. “People have been saying all kinds of stuff about about him, really good and really bad. He’s taken it all in stride.”
Only now he’ll have to thrive amid the biggest spotlight of the sport in the NCAA Tournament, where college stars can become even bigger names amid the upsets and buzzer-beaters that captivate the country every spring.
The 6-foot-9, 205-pound forward gets his shot, one stuffed full of storylines.
First there’s the injury, when he rolled his ankle after coming down on a rebound and crashed to the court in last Thursday’s ACC quarterfinal against Georgia Tech. He hobbled to the bench and pounded a chair in frustration before heading to the bowels of the Spectrum Center in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he had X-rays and was briefly spotted by TV cameras in a wheelchair before walking out on his own power — no boot, no crutches — to rejoin his team after halftime.
He hasn’t played since, though coach Jon Scheyer expressed optimism that Flagg could be ready for Friday’s home-state opener against the American-Mount St. Mary’s winner about a half-hour from the Duke campus.
There was also the Blue Devils losing versatile defender Maliq Brown to a shoulder injury only moments before Flagg was hurt. And Scheyer has had to shake up staff duties with assistant and defensive coordinator Jai Lucas leaving after the regular season to get the jump on his tenure as Miami’s new head coach.
“Cooper’s got an opportunity here to do some real hero stuff,” said ACC Network analyst Luke Hancock, the Final Four most outstanding player for Louisville’s later-vacated NCAA title run in 2013. “You can come back from injury and you find a way to lead the team with Jai Lucas leaving and Maliq Brown being hurt.
“If Cooper Flagg wins the national championship, it’s going to be, ‘Look what he did coming out of the wheelchair in the ACC Tournament,’ just kind of adding to the story.”
And what a story it’s already been.
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