Why's Cooper Flagg Struggling To Score? Mavs Star Not Meeting High Standard

Cooper Flagg scored 19 points on Wednesday night to add to his 10 rebounds and five assists in a 112-111 loss to San Antonio that came down to the final possession.

The Mavericks' budding star struggled from the floor, shooting 7-for-19 overall, including 0-for-3 from three-point range.

San Antonio was led by an otherworldly performance from their young star in Victor Wembanyama, who finished the night with 52 points, 24 rebounds, and 8 blocks, and they needed every bit of it. The Spurs extended their win streak to six, beating the Mavericks for the second time this season.

While Wembanyama had a standout night, Flagg, for the second consecutive game, has struggled to score. 

Looking at his last two, Flagg has averaged 18 points, 7 rebounds, and just over 5 assists. These numbers are certainly solid, but when we look deeper into the shooting splits, the stats show that this isn't up to Flagg's standard.

In Monday's game against the Sacramento Kings, Flagg finished with 17 points on 3-for-19 from the floor with 0-for-4 from downtown.

If you're counting along at home, when you add the three-point attempts from the game against San Antonio, Coop is 0-for-7 from distance in his last two contests.

Now, when a second-year player struggles during a season, some like to pull out the 'sophomore slump' excuse; however, this really doesn't describe what Flagg is going through.

Going into Wednesday night, he was top 15 in the league in points per game, doing the majority of his damage at the rim and from the mid-range while leading Dallas in usage rate at 28.6 percent.

When you put that amount of responsibility on a player, you will certainly feel it when they struggle to shoot the basketball.

When you can't score, you need to find other ways to be effective, and that is what Flagg did against San Antonio.

Mavericks' head coach Dusty May highlighted his effectiveness elsewhere on the floor post-game. 

"I thought he was making shots that he had made all year to that point, and they just weren't dropping for him," May said. "But I thought he just got lost in rebounding, and I thought he made great passes- just a really good floor game in the second half.

He is doing the little things right. He is grabbing boards and, at one point, had five straight assists without a turnover against San Antonio, and in the second half he got it going in the scoring department with 15 of his 19 in that timeframe.

Flagg lost his aggressiveness on drives and couldn't get to his spot at any point in the first half, finishing 1-for-11.

One player who noticed this was Kyrie Irving, who finished the night with a team-leading 29 points. He discussed the importance of Flagg continuing to learn as a pro and dealing with tough stretches.

"He is going to go through ups and downs just like every other professional, it doesn't take away from his talent or what he's capable of doing," Irving said. "He has the confidence in himself, but I think he knows it's just a choice that he's got to make at times, just to go out and be aggressive and seek his own shot."

Dallas will need an aggressive and confident Cooper Flagg if they want any chance of continuing the early success they've had this season.

The Dallas Mavericks (4-4) will return to action on Friday night at home with a matchup against the Utah Jazz (1-7) at 7:00 p.m. CT.