DURHAM, N.C. — It wasn’t just the skill. It was the impertinence.

Cameron Hildreth was the last man between Cooper Flagg and the basket in the open floor. Even in the best of circumstances, there probably wouldn’t be much he could do.

In this circumstance, gamely standing in the path of the best player in college basketball, there was nothing. Flagg, a native of Newport, Maine, crossed over and went past Hildreth like he was standing still and went up for his final, thunderous dunk in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

Rude. Impolite. Impertinent. A punctuation mark to the final home game of a college career that will be unavoidably and lamentably short.

Just when it seems like Flagg is truly flourishing, layers upon layers to his game, or maybe we’ve just seen enough of him to fully appreciate it, he’s almost done. There’s an absolute maximum of 10 games left in his Duke career, at least one and probably three more in this area code, none at home.

His box score line in Monday’s 93-60 win over Wake Forest was impressive enough: 28 points, eight rebounds, seven assists, three blocks, two steals. It barely scratched the surface of his impact. It’s everything else he does that etches itself into memory.

After that dunk, he went down to the other end to tip away a post entry for a break the other way. The number of deflections to teammates Flagg gets on 50-50 rebounds is insane. He has the ability to get vertical and block a shot in the lane while backpedaling. Faced up with Tre’Von Spillers, he spun in tight quarters to get to the rim.

Efton Reid found a way past the extended arms of Khaman Maluach, only for Flagg to slither along the baseline and knock his shot away. He did the same thing on the rebound of a missed Maluach 3-pointer, coming silently from the wing past Wake players in position to grab the ball, then continuing under the rim for a reverse layup.

“He plays so hard. He’s competitive. He’s a great teammate. And obviously his versatility is special,” Duke coach Jon Scheyer said. “As a coach it allows you to do so many things because of his versatility. He’s guarding one through five. There’s not really a matchup for him. If you double him, he passes. If it’s one-on-one, he scores it. And he just has that feel for when the game’s on the line, or the game rises, he’s going to do it himself.”

It was an impeccable coda to Saturday’s interrupted performance, when Flagg spent the first half going back and forth to the locker room after taking a hard shot to the face on a drive to the basket against Florida State. He was officially unlikely to return at halftime because of an eye injury, but he ended up playing most of the second half.

There were no signs of that in this farewell, the now-time-honored Duke tradition of Freshman Night, honoring the basketball interns who spend a year in Durham before moving onto the NBA. From the perspective of NBA scouts, Flagg may be the best of that bunch, a group that has accounted for three prior No. 1 overall picks going back to Kyrie Irving.

After Duke’s win in Winston-Salem earlier in the season, Wake Forest coach Steve Forbes called Flagg a “generational” player, comparing him to Kevin Durant, among others. After Monday, he took that specific comparison further.

“KD, he’s pretty good. I think (Flagg) is too,” Forbes said. “I would say that Cooper does more, at this point. Now, will he be as prolific as a scorer? I don’t know about that. But I’d put those two guys in the same breath, of guys that I’ve coached against in my career.”

With 3:34 to play, Flagg exited the floor at Cameron for the last time. Maluach followed. Kon Kneuppel had already exited. The crowd chanted “one more year,” less a plea than a quip, unless Duke’s ready to ditch Nike for New Balance and New Balance is ready to write a check with seven zeroes on it.

“This is the best place in college basketball for sure,” Flagg said. “I’ve loved every single minute of being here, loved everyone I’ve met, everybody I’ve been around for this whole year. It’s been an amazing year.”

There’s one regular-season game left, Flagg’s only visit to the Smith Center. Then, the ACC tournament, where Duke still needs a win at North Carolina to be sure of the No. 1 seed even after winning an ACC-record 18 games. Then, the portion of his career that will, right or wrong, truly define his legacy. On this floor, in his temporary home, he has now done all he can.