DALLAS (AP) — Cooper Flagg set a host of records for an NBA teenager in an also-ran season for the Dallas Mavericks. Kon Knueppel helped the Charlotte Hornets to a 25-win improvement that almost led to a spot in the playoffs.
It's no wonder they ended up in a tight Rookie of the Year race.
Flagg edged his former Duke teammate to win the award Monday night after becoming the first rookie since Michael Jordan in 1984-85 to lead his team in points, rebounds, assists and steals.
The 19-year-old Flagg and Knueppel were first and second in rookie scoring, the first former college teammates to do that since UConn stars Emeka Okafor and Ben Gordon in 2004-05. Philadelphia's VJ Edgecombe was the other finalist.
Flagg and Knueppel traded places as betting favorites during the season, but Flagg's 96-point outburst over two games on the second-to-last weekend might have tipped the scales. Flagg was the favorite going into the announcement.
The first of those games was Flagg's 51-point showing against Orlando, the first time a teenager has scored 50 in the NBA. He broke his own record for a teenager of 49, set against Knueppel and the Hornets in January.
“I see the games every night. I can check the box scores,” Flagg said when asked how close of an eye he kept on Knueppel. “I think also I was watching Kon just because that’s one of my brothers. We had such a good connection, and we’re gonna be there for each other for the rest of our lives. I was watching him as a fan as well, but there was obviously that competition at the same time.”
It was, as expected, one of the closest votes in Rookie of the Year history.
Only 26 points separated Flagg and Knueppel in a balloting where 100 reporters and broadcasters who cover the league ranked their top three rookies, with five points going to first place, three to second and one to third.
In 2002, Scottie Barnes edged Evan Mobley by 15 points.
There were three years where the award was shared because of a tie in the voting, and two of those included Duke players Elton Brand and Grant Hill. Brand and Steve Francis tied for the award in 2000, Hill and Jason Kidd — Flagg’s current coach — tied in 1995 and Dave Cowens and Geoff Petrie tied in 1971.
Knueppel, who was a one-and-done at Duke just like Flagg but turned 20 before his NBA career started, became the first rookie to lead the league in 3-pointers with 273.
He averaged 18.5 points, 5.3 rebounds and 3.4 assists, while shooting 42.5% from 3-point range to join Larry Bird and Paul Pierce as only the only NBA rookies to average 15 points and five rebounds per game while shooting better than 40% from beyond the arc.
Behind Knueppel, Charlotte won 44 games before being eliminated by Orlando in the final round of the play-in tournament.
Flagg thought he was joining a playoff contender after the Mavericks converted a 1.8% chance in the draft lottery and took him No. 1 overall. Knueppel was the fourth pick.
Oft-injured center Anthony Davis was sidelined again as Dallas started slowly, and was traded to Washington before Flagg's fellow Duke alum, Kyrie Irving, could return from a knee injury. The Mavericks eventually decided to keep Irving out the entire season.
Despite his team's steady slide in the standings, Flagg kept making history a year after leading Duke to the Final Four as just the fourth freshman to be named AP men’s basketball player of the year.
Flagg and Jordan are the only rookies to record multiple games of at least 45 points since the NBA-ABA merger in 1976-77.
Flagg was playing against LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers earlier this month when he scored 45 points and passed the 41-year-old for the most 40-point games by a teenager with his fourth. That game was the capper to the big weekend that might have decided the rookie race.
The Mavericks ended up back in the lottery at 26-56, with Flagg having to carry a much heavier load than anticipated. He averaged 21.0 points, 5.4 rebounds, 4.5 assists and 1.2 steals in 70 games.
“I think you talk about pressure and things like that, this season was a lot different going into it and what I was expecting and how the season ended up turning out,” Flagg said. “I think dealing with that and adjusting and kind of getting thrown in on the fly right away like that helped me long-term and throughout the season just getting really comfortable. I think I grew in a lot of different areas.”
The rookie award was the sixth to be announced by the NBA since the end of the regular season. The others:
— San Antonio’s Victor Wembanyama was the unanimous Defensive Player of the Year.
— Oklahoma City’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander got 96 of a possible 100 first-place votes to win the Clutch Player of the Year award.
— San Antonio’s Keldon Johnson won Sixth Man of the Year.
— Boston’s Derrick White won the Sportsmanship Award. That award, unlike most others, is selected solely by active players.
— Atlanta’s Nickeil Alexander-Walker won Most Improved Player.
Other award announcements yet to be scheduled include MVP (either Gilgeous-Alexander, Wembanyama or Denver’s Nikola Jokic) and Coach of the Year (either Detroit’s J.B. Bickerstaff, San Antonio’s Mitch Johnson or Boston’s Joe Mazzulla).
The NBA will announce the Executive of the Year, the Twyman-Stokes Teammate of the Year and the Hustle Award winner later this week.
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AP Sports Writer Steve Reed in Charlotte, North Carolina, and AP Basketball Writer Tim Reynolds in Miami contributed to this report.
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