Kelly Flagg nearly agreed not to have any more kids. Her first pregnancy, with twins Hunter and Ryder in 2004, ended tragically with the loss of Ryder two days after birth, and her husband didn’t want his wife — and his family — to go through anything so painful again.
“Ralph didn’t want me to have any more kids,” Kelly Flagg told NJ Advance Media on Friday. “He said, ‘We’re not doing this again.’”
But they did. And they survived what Kelly described as a “terrifying” pregnancy in 2006, when she gave birth to another set of twins — Cooper and Ace — who arrived after just 34 weeks and five days.
Today, those boys are playing basketball at national power Montverde Academy in Florida, wowing fans, college coaches and NBA scouts. Cooper, at 6-foot-9, is on his way to Duke next season as the No. 1 prospect in the Class of 2024 and then likely to the NBA as the projected No. 1 overall pick in 2025.
“I really wanted more children so [Ralph] agreed to do it one more time, and thankfully, with the help of medical professionals, we were able to get to the finish line and have a much better experience,” Kelly said.
The Flaggs came to the Bristol-Myers Squibb Children’s Hospital at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick, where they visited children in the neonatal intensive care unit.
“I don’t know a ton about how it all happened,” Cooper, 17, said. “But I think it’s obviously a miracle.”
‘A LONG, EMOTIONAL ROLLER-COASTER’
Kelly Flagg was a basketball star in her own right.
She scored 1,257 points at Nokomis High School in Newport, Maine, and started for the University of Maine, where she played alongside the late Stacey Porrini Clingan, a thousand-point scorer, too. Clingan’s son, UConn men’s star Donovan Clingan, is a projected first-round pick in this summer’s NBA Draft. He tried to recruit Cooper Flagg to UConn.
After settling down with Ralph in Newport, Kelly became pregnant with Hunter and Ryder in 2004, but the pregnancy grew complicated. She went into pre-term labor at roughly 23 weeks and had to be transported by ambulance from her doctor’s office to a hospital in Portland.
“I was able to hang on for another six days and our oldest two sons, Hunter and Ryder, were born at 24 weeks and five days [on Aug. 4, 2004],” Kelly said. “And Ryder lived for two days. Hunter was 1 pound, 10 ounces, and Ryder was 1 pound, 8 ounces when they were born.”
Hunter spent 109 days in the hospital — most of that time in the NICU — before he was transferred to the Continuing Care Nursery at Maine Medical Center in Portland. During that time, Kelly and Ralph stayed at the Ronald McDonald House — which comforts and cares for sick children and their families — about a half mile from the hospital.
“Every morning, I would walk to the hospital and I would sit next to Hunter’s [incubator] all day and then in the afternoon, I would go back and eat dinner,” Kelly said. “Ralph worked in Portland, and we would sit in the NICU until 9 or 10 o’clock and then we would go back to the Ronald McDonald House.”
When Montverde played two games in Maine last month, billed as the “Maine Event,” organizers raised $5,000 for the Ronald McDonald House. Proceeds from this week’s Metro Classic will donated to the Robert Wood Johnson Children’s Hospital.
Hunter had retinopathy of prematurity as a result being exposed to oxygen before his retinas were fully developed, so he is blind in his right eye. He came home from the hospital on Nov. 21, 2004, two days after his due date, “so that was pretty cool,” Kelly said. His parents nicknamed him “Runter” — “because he’s the runt of the litter,” Kelly joked. She kept a daily scrapbook detailing how he grew.
“It was a long, emotional whole roller coaster, for sure, and I don’t wish it on anyone” Kelly said.
Hunter now stands 6-3, wears a size 14 sneaker and is a student at Central Maine Community College, where he hopes to pursue a career in sports business.
“He’s very bright and capable,” Kelly said. “He’s a great student. He’s always been an honor roll student.”
‘A MUCH BETTER EXPERIENCE’
After the loss of Ryder, Kelly had to talk her husband into trying to have kids again. And she wanted only one this time. She had a natural fear and anxiety “about something going wrong” after her first pregnancy.
“I had an emergency C-section the first time,” she said. “Because I was not that far along in my pregnancy — only 24 weeks — I had a certain type of C-section, so there was a risk the second time of having a uterine rupture, which basically means that I could’ve bled out if I went into labor on my own and started having contractions.”
Kelly was admitted to Maine Medical Center in Portland on Dec. 1, 2006, before she went into labor, “because you only have about 10 minutes to get the baby, or babies, out before they could drown,” she added. “It’s, like, really high risk.”
A typical pregnancy lasts about 280 days or 40 weeks. A preterm or premature baby is delivered before 37 weeks. Cooper and Ace were born on Dec. 21 after about 34 weeks.
“They were much further cooked in the oven,” she joked. “Ace weighed 6 pounds, 2 ounces, and Cooper was 5 pounds, 9 ounces.” Cooper was especially long and wiry at nearly 23 inches.
“By the time they came,” Kelly said, “I was ready to give them an eviction notice.”
After the births, Kelly and Ralph went into the NICU for a couple of minutes to hold Cooper and Ace before she returned to her room to recover. Expect the babies to be here a couple of weeks, the Flaggs was told.
Ralph woke her up about four hours later and said, “They’re in the nursery.”
“I know,” Kelly replied. “They’re in the NICU.”
“No, they’re in the nursery,” Ralph said. “They don’t need to stay in the NICU. These are big boys.”
The parents were relieved that their new set of twins were able to breathe on their own and didn’t need supplemental oxygen. The boys came home four days later, on Christmas Day, so “it was a much better experience,” Kelly said. “A special time.”
As the boys grew taller in their first year, Kelly’s doctor placed them in the 100th percentile for height, but Cooper was in the 25th percentile for weight. He was nicknamed “String Bean,” and his mother still calls him “Bean.”
Cooper and Ace developed into avid basketball fans by watching looped tapes of the 1985-86 Boston Celtics and Hoosiers while traveling to practices in Portland or tournaments all over New England in the family’s Dodge Caravan and, later, Chevy Suburban.
After leading leads Nokomis High School to its first state championship in 2022, the boys transferred to national power Montverde to play for Boyle, the New Jersey native who has coached six top-3 NBA Draft picks. He is known as a taskmaster and one of the best high school coaches in the business. Ace remains in the Class of 2025 and is uncommitted to college.
In August, Kelly and Ralph moved the family near Montverde, where they’re saving on DoorDash bills, Ralph said. The family cooks and eats at home together instead of having the boys order everything for delivery like they did last year. They’re a closely knit family.
“My parents went through a lot with the first set of twins and then having lost one of them, so I think it kind of brings us all together, kind of bringing it back to where our family started,” Cooper said.
‘IT’S A MIRACLE FOR SURE’
On Friday afternoon, Cooper, Ace, Kelly and Ralph walked into the NICU unit at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital. It was Kelly’s first time in an NICU unit since Cooper and Ace were born, and she teared up talking to the doctors and meeting the children in the unit.
Cooper and Ace visited with 10-year-old Yasin Holder, who was born prematurely at 28 1/2 weeks. His eyes lit up behind his mask as he saw the giant twins. Cooper and Ace presented him with an autographed basketball and Cooper extended his arms to make a circle so Yasin could shoot hoops through them. Cooper bounced the ball back and forth to Yasin.
On Thursday, Yasin had just been given a Nerf basketball hoop by the doctors because of his good behavior.
“Now he’s got a ball to go with it,” Melissa Leiby, the Child Life Coordinator at the hospital, told everyone assembled to watch the interaction. He told them LeBron was his favorite NBA player. Cooper met and talked with LeBron at last summer’s Nike Peach Jam, and told Yasin, “Maybe you’ll get to meet LeBron, too, someday.
Yasin always will have the memory of meeting Cooper, a fellow premature baby who might never have been born had things gone differently. Like LeBron, he might end up being the No. 1 pick in the NBA Draft.
“There was a time when I said, ‘This is it,’ but [Kelly] talked me out of it, and I’m glad she did, obviously,” Ralph Flagg said after watching his sons playing with Yasin. “It’s amazing, because we had such a rough time to start with, having children.
“But to have these kids and have them so healthy ... yeah, it’s a miracle for sure.”
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Adam Zagoria is a freelance reporter who covers Seton Hall and NJ college basketball for NJ Advance Media. You may follow him on Twitter @AdamZagoria and check out his Website at ZAGSBLOG.com.
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