LOS ANGELES – Duke men’s basketball freshman Cooper Flagg has been named the winner of the John R. Wooden Player of the Year, the Los Angeles Athletic Club announced on Saturday, April 5. Flagg is just the fourth freshman to win the award, joining former Blue Devil Zion Williamson (2019) and fellow rookies Anthony Davis (2012) and Kevin Durant (2007) A native of Newport, Maine, Flagg becomes the seventh Blue Devil to win the Wooden Award, more than any other program in the country, ahead of North Carolina (four) and Purdue (three). Flagg, who turned 18 years old in December 2024, is the top-rated player by EvanMiya with a combined offensive and defensive performance rating of 10.82, while also leading the KenPom Player of the Year standings with a 2.710 rating. The 6-9, 205-pound freshman leads No. 1 Duke in points (682), rebounds (271), assists (151), steals (50) and blocks per game (1.3), and ranks among the ACC’s top-10 in four of the five major statistical categories – scoring (3rd), rebounding (9th), assists (8th) and blocked shots (8th). He garnered both ACC player and rookie of the week honors in the same week five times this season, becoming the first player in ACC history to sweep the conference weekly awards more than twice. His 12 ACC Rookie of the Week citations are a new conference record. Flagg became the youngest player in NCAA history to post a 40-point game when he broke the Duke and ACC freshman single-game scoring records with 42 points versus Notre Dame on Jan. 11 and registered the first NCAA Tournament performance with at least 30 points, seven assists, six rebounds and three blocks in Duke’s Sweet 16 victory over Arizona on March 27 en route to being named East Region Most Outstanding Player.
With his Wooden award, Flagg has now been voted the National Player of the Year by five organizations, having already earning the accolade from the United State Basketball Writers Associated (USBWA), National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC), the Associated Press (AP) and CollegeInsider.com. Flagg also swept the ACC Player and Rookie of the Year awards and is Duke’s first consensus First Team All-American since Williamson and RJ Barrett in 2019.
The John R. Wooden Award is presented annually to the outstanding collegiate basketball Player of the Year for both men and women. Over 1,000 voters, consisting of college basketball media experts, evaluate players based on their performance throughout the entire season, including the NCAA Tournament. Flagg is the 12th different Blue Devil to win National Player of the Year recognition and ninth to be named National Player of the Year by multiple outlets in a single season.
MOST NATIONAL PLAYER OF THE YEAR HONORS (AP, Naismith, NABC, Sporting News, USBWA, Wooden)
Duke, 45 UCLA, 29 North Carolina, 23 Purdue, 18 Virginia, 14 Ohio State, 13 Cincinnati, 11 Indiana, 11 Kansas, 11 Kentucky, 11 Oklahoma, 11
MOST WINNERS OF THE WOODEN AWARD
Duke, 7 North Carolina, 4 Purdue, 3
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