Kiyan Anthony Reveals His Relationship With NBA Legend Carmelo Anthony: ‘I’m My Own Person, Not Pushed to Follow in His Footsteps’.Giang

Carmelo Anthony’s legacy will always be a part of basketball history, but the retired NBA star has made efforts recently to make sure it’s not the only part people know about his son’s own career.

That’s according to Kiyan Anthony, himself, who spoke with ESPN this week about how his dad has made it a point to allow his firstborn to be his own person — and his own player.

The sports outlet asked the 17-year-old, who’s a rising basketball star in his own right, about whether his father Carmelo, 40, had tried to convince him to attend Syracuse University next season and follow in his own footsteps.

“[My father] never pushes me to go to Syracuse just because his name is on the gym,” Kiyan told ESPN. “He did so much at Syracuse. He knows that I’m my own person. I’ve just got to make my own decision at the end of the day.”

Kiyan added: “If it is Syracuse — I go there a lot and I practice, I work out there — if it is that, that’s what it is. But he’s never going to say, ‘You got to go to Syracuse. You got to go there because I went there.’ He’s not going to make me follow in his footsteps unless I really want to.”

Kiyan is the only child of Carmelo and his ex-wife, actress and former MTV veejay La La Anthony. The couple divorced in 2021.

Anthony’s 6-foot-5 teenage son is the No. 36-ranked basketball prospect in the country, according to ESPN. He says his decision about where he will attend college will come in the next two months, choosing between Auburn, USC, Florida State, Ohio State, Rutgers and, yes, Syracuse — where his father helped lead the school to its first NCAA National Championship in 2003.

Carmelo went on to play 19 seasons in the NBA, finishing his career with the 10th-most points all-time throughout his tenures with the Denver Nuggets, the New York Knicks and later the Oklahoma City Thunder, Houston Rockets, Portland Trail Blazers and the Los Angeles Lakers.

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Syracuse has long recruited Kiyan, as well, first offering him a basketball scholarship when he was 15 years old.

“Even though I know basically the whole world wants me to go to Syracuse, I still haven’t made the decision yet,” Kiyan told ESPN, adding that he still has to research the schools and their basketball programs more to see which team is the best fit.

“I will rely on my parents a lot with their advice and how they think a school fits me,” he says.

And while most basketball fans would expect that advice to come from his father, a 10-time NBA All Star and three-time Olympic gold medalist, Kiyan says it’s his mother La La Anthony who often provides him the most direction in life.

“I would say everybody sees when the cameras are on [my dad] and then they’re on me because I’m playing good, but I would say my mom does a lot more background stuff,” Kiyan told ESPN. “Like, when I’m going through something or I need somebody to talk to, my mom is definitely the person. And she’s the one who really pushes me to get in the gym, even if I don’t want to. To go to school and stay on top of my grades and stuff like that.”