{"id":176857,"date":"2026-02-08T14:17:45","date_gmt":"2026-02-08T19:17:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=176857"},"modified":"2026-02-08T14:17:45","modified_gmt":"2026-02-08T19:17:45","slug":"cooper-flagg-better-rookie-season-than-wemby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2026\/02\/08\/cooper-flagg-better-rookie-season-than-wemby\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Cooper Flagg Having A Better Rookie Season Than Wemby?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Victor Wembanyama<\/a> made waves living up to his hype as a rookie. But with Cooper Flagg<\/a> scoring 30 regularly, is Flagg having a better rookie season? Despite the great rookie season Wembanyama had and the great one Flagg is having, both their teams struggled. Flagg is currently at the top of this year’s ROTY race<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Is Cooper Flagg Having A Better Rookie Season Than Wemby?<\/h2>\n

Who Had More Help?<\/h3>\n

The San Antonio Spurs two years ago were a disappointingly consistent franchise, owning the same record the year Victor joined the team and the year before. The Dallas Mavericks are the complete opposite. The Mavs are an ever-changing organization with firings, trades, and lineup changes. To much criticism<\/a>, Flagg has been the team’s starting point guard for the entire season. Similarly, Wembanayma’s rookie season was filled with calls to get him better help at the point<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Mavericks currently have 19 wins, making it unlikely they don’t pass the 2023-2024 Spurs’ win total. Something that Flagg has benefited from also was having Anthony Davis<\/a> on his team. Davis served as a former All-Star who could mentor Flagg. That’s something that Wembanyama didn’t have. Also missing from Wembanayma’s team was a significant veteran presence outside from head coach Gregg Popovich. Overall Flagg has better teammates than Wembanyama did, but has a harder situation overall, due to the stress placed on Dallas to win fans back after the Luka trade.<\/p>\n

Head-To-Head Matchups<\/h3>\n
\"Feb
Feb 5, 2026; Dallas, Texas, USA; San Antonio Spurs forward Victor Wembanyama (1) moves the basket past Dallas Mavericks forward Cooper Flagg (32) during the first quarter at the American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

San Antonio has officially swept Dallas so far in their matchups. That Includes Flagg’s debut game against the Spurs in October where he was able to get a bare-minimum double-double. Despite Cooper averaging worse stats against the Spurs, he was able to notch out a 32-point game this past Thursday. He outscored Wemby but did so on worse efficiency.<\/p>\n

It should be no shock that Wembanyama is averaging better stats against the Mavs this season, given his superior team. On this season’s tip-off, he dropped 40 points on Flagg. Although Flagg hasn’t beaten Wemby yet, it should be mentioned that Flagg’s mid-range game is coming along extremely well and he was able to show that off in his 32-point duel against Wemby.<\/p>\n

Defense Holds The Answer<\/h3>\n

When you look at the scoring between the two players, you may be shocked. The stats show Cooper Flagg as a better offensive player<\/a>. Both players average around 20 points, but Flagg has better shooting percentage. He was also able to dish out slightly more assists. Although some of this may be due to having more help offensively, with teammates Naji Marshall<\/a> and P.J Washington<\/a> both averaging close to 15 points per game, it doesn’t change the fact that Victor’s otherworldly highlights may have caused us to forget his real strength when it comes to basketball.<\/p>\n

Cooper Flagg’s defense was highly touted coming into the league. Wembanyama, on the other hand, is compared to all-time greats<\/a> like Hakeem Olajuwon<\/a> regularly. Flagg is a solid defender but that can’t make up for the grand difference made by Wemby’s shot blocking ability. Flagg averages less than a block per game, but Wemby in his rookie season was able to average close to four blocks. Interestingly, Victor averaged slightly over a steal per game, which matches what Flagg is averaging.<\/p>\n

The Last Word<\/h3>\n

Cooper Flagg was clearly on a hot streak recently, scoring over 30-points for four games straight. But that streak has ended with a quiet 14-point game against the Spurs yesterday. Flagg does not get enough credit for the mountain of pressure he has to deal with and how well he has performed all things considered. The Spurs did a much better job keeping their organization out of drama and making sure it is a stable place for young talent to improve, but what else is new?<\/p>\n

Flagg may not be able to have as good as year as Wembanyama did his first season, as Wemby was a strong DPOY candidate. But if his 30-point streaks become the norm, then he might have a season to be remembered forever.<\/p>\n

\u00a9 Jerome Miron-Imagn Images<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Victor Wembanyama made waves living up to his hype as a rookie. But with Cooper Flagg scoring 30 regularly, is Flagg having a better rookie season? Despite the great rookie season Wembanyama had and the great one Flagg is having, both their teams struggled. Flagg is currently at the top of this year’s ROTY race. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5757,"featured_media":176940,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,30,2,62,34],"tags":[240,48964,2288,2111,4669],"class_list":["post-176857","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-mavericks","category-featured","category-nba","category-spurs","tag-anthony-davis","tag-cooper-flagg","tag-naji-marshall","tag-pj-washington","tag-victor-wembanyama"],"modified_by":"Jordan Pagkalinawan","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5757"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=176857"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176857\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176947,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/176857\/revisions\/176947"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/176940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=176857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=176857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=176857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}