It was no surprise that Donovan Clingan, the UConn men’s basketball star from Bristol, was tasked with showing the nation’s No. 1 overall recruit Cooper Flagg around campus during his official visit over the weekend.
The two elite New England basketball players, Flagg from Newport, Maine, have known each other for a while and are close family friends. Their mothers, Kelly Bowman Flagg and the late Stacey Porrini Clingan, played Division I hoops together at the University of Maine in the 90s.
Stacey died of breast cancer in March 2018 and is being posthumously being inducted into the UMaine Sports Hall of Fame this year.
Flagg’s official visit in Storrs provided a unique opportunity for the sons to make a special tribute to their mothers.
It’s customary for recruits to play a game of dress-up in the school’s uniform for a photoshoot, and Flagg, whose parents joined him on the visit, did. He posed in multiple different UConn uniform combinations, using national championship trophies and the program’s new, diamond Husky chain as props – in one picture, Dan Hurley is wearing the chain and Flagg is to his left holding a red lightsaber.
#UConn #CooperFlagg pic.twitter.com/X3YadvHSMR
— CUE THE MUSIC (@Cue_the_Music) September 26, 2023
But then the shoot got more sentimental.
Clingan joined the Class of 2024 superstar as they put on their moms’ UMaine uniforms, Flagg wearing No. 11 and Clingan No. 32. They took a number of photos in the Maine threads, including one back-to-back and another holding the Maine state flag.
Flagg posted seven photos from the shoot to his Instagram page captioned: “Bleed Blue..?” with a Husky and a blue heart emoji. Former Huskies Andre Jackson, RJ Cole and Tyrese Martin commented on the post as well as Clingan and current Huskies Alex Karaban and Jayden Ross.
“Stacey was an amazing role model for me during my time at UMaine,” Bowman Flagg posted as a comment under a Facebook post from the Maine Women’s Basketball account which shared a profile of the soon-to-be Hall of Famer. “She was a great competitor and an awesome teammate. I had the privilege and honor to spend some time with her son, Donovan (National Champion), who has followed in his mom’s footsteps as a player.
“This past weekend, Cooper took an official visit at UConn and we were able to do this special photo shoot with both of them wearing their mom’s jerseys. It was a special moment.”
Clingan’s father, Bill, responded to Bowman Flagg’s comment on Twitter, saying “Thank you Kelly…….tears” and later, after the shoot caught traction on the internet, “Man I cried.”
No. 1 player in the country Cooper Flagg took his official visit to UConn over the weekend
What do y’all think? @Cooper_Flagg pic.twitter.com/zDL3tAUJap
— B/R Hoops (@brhoops) September 26, 2023
“Stacey was extremely driven, extremely motivated, hardworking. She was an incredibly nice person, an incredibly caring person and people want to be just like her,” Bill Clingan told The Courant last year, saying Donovan’s game went to the next level after she passed as he sets out to carry on her legacy. Donovan wears the No. 32 at UConn, as he did at Bristol Central High, in her honor.
Stacey Porrini led Maine to consecutive conference titles and the program’s first three NCAA tournament appearances in her final three years of college. According to the feature story, she ranks fifth in UMaine history with 929 rebounds, is 17th on the career scoring list with 1,128 points and averaged 9.6 points and 7.9 rebounds per game for her career.
Donovan Clingan made a significant impact as a freshman playing behind Adama Sanogo during UConn’s national championship season last year. He averaged 6.9 points, 5.6 rebounds and 1.8 blocks in just 13.1 minutes off the bench per game and was named to the Big East All-Freshman team at season’s end. Clingan, the 7-foot-2 center, is set to be the face of UConn’s program as a sophomore and is projected as a Top 10 pick in next year’s NBA Draft.
Flagg, a 6-foot-8 forward, will reportedly be making official visits to Kansas Oct. 6-8 and Duke Oct. 20-22.
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