Carmelo Anthony made Olympic history when he won his record third gold medal in his record fourth Olympics for U.S men’s basketball. Unfortunately, his Olympic success has shone a light on his NBA failure, and Anthony’s college coach offered a bleak prediction for the remainder of the veteran’s NBA career.
via ESPN:
“He’s unlikely to win an NBA title,” Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said, according to the Syracuse Post-Standard. “He’s never been on a team that even had a remote chance of winning an NBA title. As a player, all you can do is try to make your team better, and every team he’s been on he’s made them a lot better. Denver hadn’t done anything prior to him getting there and he took them into the playoffs. They weren’t going to beat the Lakers or the Spurs. In those years, they won the championship most of the time.”
Anthony, 32, made the playoffs in each of the first 10 seasons of his career. But he has advanced past the first round just twice. Anthony’s New York Knicks have missed the postseason for the past three years.
“He wants to win in New York,” Boeheim said. “I know the general opinion is if [new additions Joakim] Noah and [Derrick] Rose are healthy then they’ll be a better team. It’s just a question of if they will be healthy. They’ve been off and on the last two years. They’ve both been hurt. I think if both those guys are healthy, it certainly would make a big difference and [Kristaps] Porzingis continuing to progress. If those things happen, they can be better.”
Anthony won an NCAA championship under Boeheim at Syracuse.
