Dallas Mavericks 2026-27 Roster : A retool around Cooper Flagg, Kyrie Irving’s return and Dusty May’s debut

The Dallas Mavericks are heading into the 2026-2027 season under a first-time NBA head coach, Dusty May, hired on June 22, 2026, after a sweeping offseason that reshaped the roster around Rookie of the Year Cooper Flagg and Kyrie Irving’s expected return from his ACL injury. Dallas parted ways with Jason Kidd on May 19, 2026, after five seasons on the bench, then spent the following two months using trades, the draft and a contract extension to retool the roster around its young star.

The end of the Kidd era and the arrival of Dusty May

Jason Kidd’s tenure in Dallas ended after a 26-56 finish in 2025-2026, according to CBS Sports and Yahoo Sports, closing out five seasons in charge. A month later, the Mavericks turned to Dusty May, who arrived from the University of Michigan, where he went 64-13 over two seasons and won an NCAA title, after previously leading Florida Atlantic to a Final Four. It is his first NBA coaching job.

May inherits a team built around Cooper Flagg, the No. 1 pick of the 2025 draft, who was named NBA Rookie of the Year on April 27, 2026, ahead of former Duke teammate Kon Knueppel of the Charlotte Hornets. Flagg averaged 21.0 points, 6.6 rebounds and 4.5 assists across 70 games as a rookie, shooting 46.8% from the field and 29.4% from 3-points. Yet the offense around him struggled: according to Yahoo Sports, Dallas posted a 111.2 offensive rating last season, 27th in the league, the starting point for May’s rebuilding plan.

A retooled roster: the new arrivals

Beyond the coaching change, Dallas’s roster looks markedly different heading into 2026-2027. Zaccharie Risacher, the No. 1 pick of the 2024 draft in Atlanta, joined the Mavericks in a three-team trade completed July 19-20, 2026. Santi Aldama and Marcus Sasser both arrived from Memphis and Detroit, respectively, in the same six-team trade struck in early July 2026. Naji Marshall was retained on a three-year, $52.2 million extension, while Sergio De Larrea, a Spanish point guard, came aboard through a separate draft trade. The Mavericks also selected Morez Johnson Jr. with the No. 9 pick of the 2026 draft.

The projected starting five

According to the official ESPN Depth Chart and Roundtable, Dallas’s projected starting five for 2026-2027 is Kyrie Irving, Max Christie, Cooper Flagg, PJ Washington and Daniel Gafford.

Max Christie enters the season as the Mavericks’ projected starting shooting guard, carrying, per Roundtable, “more responsibility on both ends of the floor.” Mavs Moneyball frames him as “a 6’5″ guard with legitimate 3-point shooting, plus athleticism, defensive potential, and pick-and-roll creation chops.”

His growth into that starting role is one of the clearer building blocks of the retooled group. Christie’s ability to hold up on both ends could determine how much freedom May has to experiment elsewhere in the lineup.

PJ Washington’s role could shift under the new coaching staff. Yahoo Sports reported on July 5, 2026, that May “builds his offense around ball movement, pace and bigs who screen, slip and make plays,” a system in which “Washington moves back into a third or fourth option role.” That’s a departure from the more featured role he has occupied in past seasons, but it fits a frontcourt built on connective, read-and-react basketball rather than isolation scoring.

How quickly he embraces a lesser offensive role will be a storyline worth watching in May’s first season.

Daniel Gafford rounds out the frontcourt as the presumptive starting center, in a lineup that also leans on his interior presence. He has been described in coverage, including a secondary account on Instagram, DallasMavsNation, as an “elite rim protector, lob threat, high energy” presence — a profile that fits neatly into a system that wants its bigs screening, slipping and finishing above the rim.

NBA.com notes, however, that Gafford will face increased competition for center minutes in 2026-2027 after Dallas selected Morez Johnson with the No. 9 overall pick. That means his grip on the starting job may not be as secure as his current depth-chart slot suggests. Still, as the incumbent, Gafford enters camp as Dallas’s first choice at the position.

Cooper Flagg’s own role could also expand in a new direction. The Athletic reports that May envisions using him more at point guard within his system, even while calling him “a natural forward.” That shift would ask Flagg to initiate offense far more often than he did as a rookie, when Dallas’s attack ranked 27th in the league in offensive rating.

Handing him more playmaking responsibility reflects how much May trusts his decision-making at this early stage of his career. How he balances that added responsibility with his existing scoring load will shape Dallas’s offensive identity all season.

Kyrie Irving anchors the backcourt as the starting point guard, in his first appearance in a Mavericks uniform since tearing his ACL in March of the 2024-2025 season. His return alone changes the math for this starting five. Pairing him with Flagg, who may take on more ball-handling duties himself, will be one of the more closely watched dynamics of training camp. Irving’s own words after being ruled out for last season — that he was “looking forward to coming back stronger next season” — now face their first real test.

Bench depth and Klay Thompson’s uncertain status

Dallas’s bench carries several newcomers with defined track records. Roundtable notes Risacher recorded 20 assists over his final 25 games as a Hawk, while SI.com reported that “some thought the Mavericks were used as a salary dump for Zaccharie Risacher, but they got the guy they wanted all along.”

Santi Aldama, acquired in the same six-team deal that brought in Sasser, has been described in some early reporting — including a secondary Instagram account, treated with caution — as a “7 foot Center.”

Marcus Sasser, per Reddit and Mavs Moneyball, is built as a traditional point guard and profiles as a backup to both Irving and Flagg.

Naji Marshall, nicknamed “The Knife,” is credited by NBA.com with sharpening his game across both starting and sixth-man roles, bringing wing versatility and, in the outlet’s words, having an impact “regardless of role” — often among the first players off the bench.

Sergio De Larrea, according to Yahoo Sports (July 29, 2026) and the Dallas Morning News (August 5, 2026), is preparing for the jump to more physical NBA basketball; while some had floated a draft-and-stash path, Mavs Moneyball argued on June 24, 2026, that he should join the roster immediately rather than stay in Europe.

Morez Johnson Jr., who played for May at Michigan, said that despite his prior relationship with the coach, “nothing is guaranteed.”

Klay Thompson’s future in Dallas remains unresolved. Hoops Rumors reported on August 15, 2026, that the Mavericks had made no progress in trade talks involving him, with some suitors hoping for a buyout instead. SI.com added in mid-August that Dallas is exploring trade scenarios that would send Thompson elsewhere, with interest reported from the Los Angeles Lakers and Miami Heat. His status for the 2026-2027 season is not settled as of now.

Cap space limits and the tools Dallas can actually use

Dallas sits comfortably below both the luxury tax and the first apron, but that financial room does not translate into the kind of open cap space that allows a team to simply sign free agents outright. ESPN’s Bobby Marks was explicit on that point on June 27, 2026: “Though the Mavericks are not a cap space team, they can use the non-tax and biannual exceptions and can take back salary in a trade.” In practice, that leaves Dallas working with the non-tax mid-level exception and the biannual exception, plus the ability to absorb incoming salary in trades, rather than a clean-slate spending spree.

The Mavericks also still hold a sizable trade tool from the Anthony Davis deal that sent him to Washington in February 2026. That trade generated a $20.8 million trade exception, which Third Apron described as “one of the biggest existing trade exceptions in the league,” noting Dallas “will have one year to use that exception.” Roundtable and Yahoo Sports both reported the same figure in June, adding that the exception “allows Dallas to acquire a player making up to $21 million without sending salary back in return.” No reporting in hand shows the exception has been used, and it runs one year from the February 2026 trade, i.e. through February 2027, giving Dallas a mid-season lever it can still pull if the right opportunity comes up.

A measured outlook for 2026-2027

Where exactly that leaves Dallas in the Western Conference depends on which projection you trust. Yahoo Sports set the Mavericks’ win total at 35.5 on July 28, 2026, good for 11th in the West, while BetMGM pegged the number slightly lower at 34.5 as of mid-August, framing Dallas as a team that “could compete for a playoff [race].” TeamRankings’ algorithmic model is far more pessimistic, projecting a 26-56 finish with a 0.0% chance of reaching the playoffs. SportDFW, meanwhile, put a floor on the season at 30 to 35 wins, tying that range directly to the health of Kyrie Irving and Dereck Lively II upon their returns.

That spread, from roughly the mid-20s to the mid-30s in projected wins, underscores just how unsettled Dallas’s outlook is entering camp. Nothing here points to a contender. Instead, the season reads as a genuine retooling year, one in which the swing factors are the same ones already shaping the roster build: how quickly Cooper Flagg grows into an expanded playmaking role, how Kyrie Irving looks in his first games back from a torn ACL, how Dusty May’s system translates from Michigan to the NBA in his first head-coaching job, and how much the reworked bench — from Risacher and Aldama to Sasser and De Larrea — can support them along the way.