Kiyan Anthony has never had a typical life.
He grew up fist-bumping LeBron James and Kevin Durant in NBA locker rooms, he texts Hollywood star Michael B. Jordan to talk ball and he calls Kim Kardashian his “aunt.” It takes a lot to make the 18-year-old college freshman starstruck. But at an event full of Hollywood A-listers, he was left speechless when music icons Jay-Z and Beyoncé were just across the room.
“In the locker room with my dad at the NBA All-Star Game, seeing the best players in the world, I thought that was normal,” Kiyan told ESPN. “My mom had me in a different world.”
When you grow up in the center of two celebrities’ spotlights — Hall of Famer Carmelo Anthony is Kiyan’s father; actress, producer and bestselling-author La La Anthony his mother — you’re used to attention. But the nature of that attention intensifies when you choose to play for the same university where your dad became a legend.
For much of his life, Kiyan lived with the expectation that he would one day follow in his father’s footsteps. Having led Syracuse to its only men’s national basketball title in 2003, Carmelo left behind massive shoes to fill — his jersey hanging in the rafters next to a practice facility named after him. That legacy is both a boost and a burden for his son, whose 1 million-plus Instagram followers made Kiyan a unique four-star high school recruit.
His commitment seemed like the anointing of a prince. But as Kiyan finally steps into his own spotlight, he is determined to chase his own dreams — and prove that he’s more than his father’s son.
“When they talk about me, I just want them to talk about my development and how I keep getting better,” he said. “And how I could rise to the top.”
It’s almost eerie when you watch the videos side by side.
Early in his famous 33-point torching of Texas in the 2003 Final Four, Carmelo drove through the lane, took a bump from an opposing player, maintained his balance as the ball left his fingertips, and fell to the floor.
In a game against Drexel this November, Kiyan dribbled left, rose into the air, drew contact, then kept floating before he scored and stumbled to the floor.
At the end of both plays, father and son looked up from the ground to witness the beauty of their handiwork — then got back up, seemingly ready for more.
“I learned almost everything from him, so it just makes the game so much easier,” said Kiyan, who shares his father’s love for the midrange game. “It just makes it easier knowing what to do.”
You can clearly see similarities between them on film.
You can also see their differences.
Carmelo was listed at 6-foot-8, 220 pounds when he led the Orange to the title. He averaged 22.2 points and 10 rebounds that season and made 48% of his 3-point attempts during the NCAA tournament before going No. 3 in the 2003 NBA draft, two spots behind LeBron.
Kiyan is 6-5 and 185 pounds, averaging 11.5 points in 22.9 minutes per game off the bench. He can’t bully every opposing player the way his father could, but even if Kiyan develops into an elite player, what would that mean when his father is the greatest the school has ever produced?
“Yeah, the comparison is a little unfair,” said Jim Boeheim, the legendary former Syracuse coach.
Kiyan has learned early in his career, though, that his father’s legacy will always loom overhead. He is hounded for pictures on campus. When he showed up for a recent practice, a couple of fans were waiting for him in the facility’s lobby. And during home games, people will ask for autographs even when he’s in the layup line.
His hopes of having a full college experience and living in the dorms like his teammates lasted only a week before fans were knocking on his door. That short-lived choice summed up the difference between his journey at Syracuse and everyone else’s.
“I was like, ‘No, don’t put me off-campus. I want to stay in the dorm,'” Kiyan said. “[But] it’s hard for me just going around campus. I go to class through a different door now. It is different for me. I learned quickly that I’m normal, but I can’t portray myself that way.”
It’s inescapable. Every time Kiyan dons a Syracuse jersey with “Anthony” across the back and the No. 7 — the same one his father wore for the New York Knicks — Orange fans see Carmelo’s son.
“The work has been put in, so he should be prepared for these moments and these environments, but I tell him every single game, it’s just basketball,” Carmelo told ESPN. “That’s it. That’s my message to him. ‘You know how to play. Go out there, be better, develop, play the right way. Shoot when you’re open, pass when you’re not.'”
It also helps that Kiyan can phone a friend uniquely suited to understand: Bronny James, whom the freshman calls a confidant.
“I feel like throughout this process, you could feel like you’re alone,” Kiyan said. “You feel like the weight of the world is on your shoulders and there is nobody behind you. But then having friends like that, that are going through the same thing that I’m going through, somebody like [Bronny] — he is way ahead of me and already in the NBA and going through way worse, so it always could be worse. I feel like pressure is just an opportunity for success.”
Whenever he needs support, Kiyan turns to his best friend: his mother.
Even without pressure from either of his parents to sign with Syracuse — Carmelo and La La divorced in 2021 — Kiyan needed his mom most when it was time to pick a school.
“I told him, ‘It’s not just about doing what your dad did,'” La La said. “‘You’re a different player from your dad.’ I was like, ‘If it’s Syracuse, you go there and you pave your own way.'”
The host of MTV’s “Total Request Live” in the early 2000s, La La was the first celebrity in the family. She is Kiyan’s anchor, too. The two make trips back and forth between Syracuse and New York City to visit each other as time allows.
“I went to go visit him and I think I ended up washing eight big garbage bags of clothes,” La La said. “I’m like, ‘What is going on here?’ But I know that’s typical college stuff. It’s fine. I want him to focus on school and basketball.”
La La didn’t raise Kiyan exclusively around glitz and glamour. She made sure he had normal experiences, too. He tagged along with her on trips to Rikers Island — New York City’s largest jail — where La La’s ThreeSixty program offers mentorship to young inmates. She took him to play in the city so he could develop the same grit that has molded NYC basketball legends. And they hosted family game nights that Kiyan said would “get crazy.”
Now, Kiyan just wants to be one of the guys in the locker room. You could see the down-to-earth persona his parents encouraged after his team upset Tennessee in early December and Kiyan took over the postgame celebration video.
“Nah, let me hold the mic,” he said before he began to praise his teammates.
“Yo, I just want to say, this the best shooter in the country right here!”
“I just want to say, this the best combo guard in the country right here!”
“If you under that rim, he gonna dunk on you, bro!”
“That’s Kiyan, man,” said his Syracuse teammate Sadiq White Jr. “That’s the Kiyan that we see every day, man. He comes in here and he’s just himself. We accept him. We let him be himself. We let him let his guard down around us. We’re his brothers.”
At the Park MGM in Las Vegas — a city full of stars — Kiyan was the biggest one during Feast Week.
As he moved through a private hallway at the Players Era Festival headquarters, opposing players and coaches stopped to greet him. It was a nonstop series of head nods, handshakes and side hugs for Kiyan, who was clearly the most recognizable player in the 18-team field despite having played only four college games at the time.
He picked preparation over socializing, even declining his mom’s invitation to meet her at the Formula 1 Las Vegas Grand Prix so he could focus on basketball.
“I sent him pictures and videos. I was like, ‘I wish you were here,'” La La said. “But Kiyan needed to be locked in the gym and with his team, which is understandable.”
Despite that dedication, Kiyan wasn’t the same star on the court in Vegas that he was off of it. During Syracuse’s 0-3 run at the tournament, he finished 1-for-14 from the 3-point line. After registering double digits in three of his first four games this season, the shots stopped falling in Sin City, where his mother and father sat courtside like the event’s unofficial queen and king.
Kiyan is still molding himself into the player he wants to be.
Syracuse strength coach Rob Harris — who worked with Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Devin Booker and more NBA All-Stars over a decade-long stint at Kentucky — said Kiyan is developing the work ethic that made those players great, all with the goal of packing on the muscle that elevated his father’s game.
“He has really taken pride into the weight room,” Harris said. “He’s coming to me on off days to get extra work. That’s a huge testament to him and obviously, he’s seen his dad. You can’t grow up with that and then just be lazy. That would be disrespectful to his parents.”
Kiyan has turned a corner since his shaky play in Vegas, scoring in double figures in three straight games heading into Monday’s win over Stonehill College, posting an efficient 18 points in 20 minutes against Northeastern on Sunday.
“I love where he’s at,” Syracuse coach Adrian Autry said. “He’s going to be fine. We need him. He’s a big part of what we do. He has a maturity about him as far as the game. … He’s going to keep working and he always tries to step up to the challenge, so that’s what I love about him.”
The arc of Kiyan’s season so far highlights the most important component of his story: It’s his and his alone.
His father’s run at Syracuse was remarkable and, to date, unmatched.
But this is The Kiyan Anthony Story — and it’s just getting started.
Only he can write the next lines of this script, a weight his father prepared him to carry.
“We know that there is going to be a spotlight,” Carmelo said. “He’s been in the spotlight all of his life.”