Nico Harrison Says He Never Thought Mavs 'Would Have a Chance' to Draft Cooper Flagg
Dallas Mavericks general manager Nico Harrison thought his team would never have a chance to select Cooper Flagg in the draft.
"When I first watched him play, my first impressions were wow, it'd be great to have the No. 1 pick," Harrison said at Flagg's introductory press conference on Friday. "Just the way he impacted the game on both sides of the ball, and he played super hard. So that was my initial reaction, again. Us not thinking we would have a chance to draft him, I didn't put too much stock into it, it was more of a dream."
Dallas had a 1.8 percent chance to win the lottery, and its jump from the No. 11 spot to No. 1 before that process represents the largest move up by any NBA team in lottery history, per ESPN Research.
Needless to say, luck was on the Mavs' side.
For starters, Dallas wouldn't have had the chance to draft Flagg if they qualified for the playoffs. The Mavericks nearly did that, beating the Sacramento Kings in the play-in tournament before losing to the Memphis Grizzlies in the win-and-in game. Dallas was also above .500 most of the year before a late-season swoon.
That loss had far-reaching consequences. Harrison executed one of the most widely-panned trades in NBA history when he dealt five-time All-NBA selection Luka Dončić to the Los Angeles Lakers on Feb. 1. The Mavs did get talent back, of course, namely star big man Anthony Davis. However, the 26-year-old Dončić is a generational talent who had just led the Mavs to the NBA Finals the year before, so the trade was a questionable one at absolute best.
But now Dallas has another potential superstar in Flagg, who could very well make the Mavs a strong Western Conference contender once again. The table was already set for the Mavs to at least compete for the playoffs with Davis and Kyrie Irving leading the way, but the addition of Flagg more likely than not would seem to get them in the eight-team bracket at least.
At the very least, their chances to win the championship now (33-1, per FanDuel Sportsbook) are better than their odds were to get the No. 1 overall pick.
