Duke freshman [autotag]Cooper Flagg[/autotag] has already racked up some preseason hardware this week, earning ACC Rookie of the Year honors and making the All-ACC First Team in the conference voting, and he can now add CBS Sports Preseason Freshman of the Year to that laundry list.
Cameron Salerno and Isaac Trotter published a story about the best first-year basketball players in the country on Wednesday, and any basketball fan who has paid attention for the best few years should be unsurprised about who took the top spot.
“He is a two-way, three-level scorer capable of wrecking the game on both ends,” they wrote about the top-ranked freshman. “Flagg can shoot, get to the rim, defend, facilitate and block shots. He possesses a killer-like instinct that will allow him to thrive in a high-pressure environment at Duke.”
Flagg looked the part during his Duke debut at the Countdown to Craziness two weeks ago, showing off his ability to finish through traffic and to create space for himself near the perimeter. The Maine native’s combination of speed and size lets him guard nearly anyone on the court, and ESPN gives him more than a 50% chance to be the first overall pick in next year’s NBA draft.
The Rutgers duo of Ace Bailey and Dylan Harper joined Flagg on Salerno and Trotter’s Preseason Freshman All-American team with Connecticut’s Liam McNeeley and Baylor’s VJ Edgecombe rounding out the lineup.