Raptors get front-row seat to Flagg breakout in loss to Mavericks

DALLAS, Texas – The solace is that the Toronto Raptors are only the first ones — they won’t be the only ones. 

Through the first two games of his NBA career, Cooper Flagg had been fine, if not unspectacular. No 18-year-old rookie can be expected to figure things out instantly. The NBA is too good, the players too talented, the pace too fast — there is too much to learn. 

But three games? Turns out that’s plenty of time for a basketball savant like Flagg — the six-foot-nine rookie taken first overall this past June — to crack the code. 

The Raptors were unlucky enough to see Flagg put things together against them as he sparked the 0-2 Mavericks to their first win with his first signature performance, of which there will doubtless be many more coming. 

The difference was made in the third quarter as Flagg was single-handedly responsible for breaking open what had been a tight, competitive and entertaining contest through the first 30 minutes or so, with Toronto leading by three with six minutes to play in the period. 

Flagg, pressed into duty as a point guard while Mavericks star Kyrie Irving recovers from a torn ACL, got things rolling just after halftime when he accelerated against the Raptors’ half-court pressure, got two feet in the paint before spinning and lobbing a one-handed alley-oop to high-flying Derek Lively. 

Very impressive. No notes. 

 A few plays later, he made like an oversized Steve Nash, working a side pick-and-roll and expertly keeping the defender on his back as he kept his dribble alive in the paint long enough to draw a second defender before hitting a cutting Anthony Davis for another lob dunk. Again, an 18-year-old making veteran point guard plays at 6’9″? You don’t see that often. 

Then there was his drive from the right corner, where it sure looked like the precocious rookie purposely hit his lay-up attempt high and hard off the glass so that Davis could slam home the indirect alley-oop. The official scorer didn’t see it that way — there was no assist — but sitting courtside, that’s how it looked. With Flagg, you believe anything is possible.

Then Flagg took on Raptors rookie Collin Murray-Boyles, who was making his NBA debut after missing the first two games of the season with a strained muscle in his forearm. Murray-Boyles will be an excellent NBA defender sooner than later, but Flagg beat him with a couple of spins and a leaner in the lane. That was the first score in what ended up being the game-deciding 13-0 run as the Mavericks left Toronto in the rearview with a 139-129 win that improves their record to 1-2 and dropped the Raptors to 1-2 before they travel to San Antonio to play Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs Monday night. 

The last basket on the run was Flagg’s most spectacular NBA play yet, as he caught a pass in stride from De’Angelo Russell, rose high and slammed it over Raptors centre Sandro Mamukelashvili, who played his best game in a Toronto uniform with 16 points on 6-of-8 shooting, along with three assists, but he went viral for being Flagg’s first career poster victim. 

The Raptors had their issues against the Mavericks beyond Flagg. 

They allowed Dallas to shoot 58.8 per cent from the floor, knock down 10-of-26 threes and put them on the free-throw line 39 times, a combination that will almost never result in a win, even if they did manage to force Dallas into 20 turnovers that Toronto converted to 30 points.  

That kind of defence — the Mavericks scored 18 points on the fast break in the pivotal third quarter alone — meant that a monster game by Scottie Barnes (33 points, 11 rebounds and six assists on 12-of-24 shooting, including 3-of-5 from deep) went for naught and a strong outing by Brandon Ingram (22 points on 10-of-16 shooting, with his girlfriend, the Rapper GloRilla, sitting prominently at centre court) along with another good outing from RJ Barrett (16 points and three assists on 7-of-13 shooting while being limited to 28 minutes with foul trouble) didn’t impact the game, ultimately. 

Even as the Raptors tried to pull themselves back into it in the fourth quarter, they could never gain any traction because they couldn’t get enough stops to mount a run. Dallas shot 60 per cent from the floor in the final 12 minutes. 

The Raptors had the NBA’s third-best defence over the final three months of last season. Through the first three games of this one, they are 18^th. 

“I think our problem was transition defence,” said Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic. “They were just coming down at us with force, and we committed a lot of fouls in those situations as well. We put them on the free-throw line 39 times, not because of being overly aggressive, but because we were on our heels in transition and they were able to get to the rim a lot.” 

It didn’t help that Jakob Poeltl, the Raptors’ only true centre, struggled with fouls and played just 19 minutes, a continuation of his slow start after missing some time in pre-season with back spasms. But beyond that, the ferocity that the Raptors are capable of was missing. 

“I don’t think it was us playing small; they were just being physical, driving through contact. PJ Washington, getting to the free throw line, getting and-1 buckets, and they were just getting to the paint a lot,” said Barnes. “… it was really on us to keep helping each other and contest at the rim. We know they were going to go to the paint; they’re a big paint team, we just have to find ways to keep them out of it, be more physical.” 

Flagg was either one of the leading causes of the Raptors’ problems or the beneficiary of their shortcomings. Of his eight field goals, six came in the paint, and four were dunks in transition. The other two were wide-open threes, including his last bucket, which came after the Raptors had cut what had become a 17-point lead early in the fourth quarter back to nine midway through the fourth. That one might as well have been the dagger. Flagg ended up with 22 points, four rebounds and four assists on 8-of-14 shooting, all while playing just 29 minutes due to some foul trouble. 

“He’s good. He’s really good,” said Barnes. “To be a rookie and to play against pressure and the way he handles it so well, it really shows why he was the No.1 pick.”

Colin Murray-Boyles debut: It may not have gone the way he dreamed it up — after missing 10 days of action and the first two games of the season with a strained muscle in his forearm the rookie taken ninth overall is still waiting for his first NBA basket after going 0-4 from the floor in 13 minutes and having his old high school rival Flagg work him for a couple of tough baskets in the paint, but he’s officially an NBA player, and not everyone can say that. “It’s an adjustment, obviously,” said Murray-Boyles, who had his brother James at the game. “It’s not how I wanted it to go, but I’m just getting back in the swing of playing with the guys again and playing at that speed again. It’s been a minute. I’ll just take it one step at a time.”

The Mavericks’ other rookie: Ryan Nembhard’s rookie season is distinctly different from that of his fellow rookie, Flagg. But the Aurora, Ont. point guard out of Gonzaga has done well to land a role with the Mavericks on a two-way deal. He didn’t see the floor against the Raptors, but played 16 minutes in the season opener against the Spurs (counting eight points and five assists) and 10 minutes against Washington in the Mavericks’ second game. With Flagg learning point guard on the job, there could be a role for Nembhard in Dallas at least until Irving comes back from his knee injury, which likely won’t be until mid-season at the earliest. “I think there’s definitely an opportunity here. I’m just trying to take advantage of it. The coaches believe in me, I feel like, so I’m hoping to continue with it.” A gifted passer, Nembhard feels he’s got no shortage of targets with the Mavericks. “There are so many talented guys here, so many guys who can put it in the rim, I just have to get it to them in the right spot and right time, it makes my job pretty easy.”

Triano key figure in Dallas: As long as the Mavericks had Luka Doncic playing point guard, their offensive philosophy was simple: let the superstar Slovenian point guard manage nearly every possession. But when Doncic was traded to the Lakers last season, Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd recognized a new approach was required, so he hired former Canadian men’s national team head coach and long-time NBA assistant to help run the Mavericks’ offence. Triano has developed a reputation as somewhat of an offensive guru — he helped the Sacramento Kings to the NBA’s No. 1 ranked offence in his first season there in 2022-23 and the Charlotte Hornets to the ninth best offensive rating in 2021-22. “When you talk about offence, he’s one that’s at the top of the list,” said Kidd. “We’re very lucky to have him on board for us.”