While Carmelo Anthony ran the Carrier Dome floor, all Michael Carter-Williams and Jerami Grant could do was watch.

Two of Syracuse’s most recent NBA exports — now teammates on the Philadelphia 76ers — ended a day that was mostly about recovering and remembering, as spectators. They wore suit jackets on the same bench where they each mostly sat for one year before starring for another then leaving Syracuse for the NBA.

“That year I learned a lot more about basketball than I have in my whole life,” Carter-Williams said.

Carter-Williams is out with a right shoulder injury and Grant sat with a high ankle sprain. So they watched with the 11,259 fans in attendance Tuesday night as Anthony’s New York Knicks beat their Philadelphia 76ers, 84-77, in an NBA preseason game. Anthony led Syracuse to its only national championship in 2003 and every time he touched the ball, gasps and shouts could be heard from the Carrier Dome crowd.

After visiting with old friends and coaches earlier Tuesday, the exhibition was mostly about quietly preparing for the upcoming season — just in fondly, familiar confines for the former SU players.

“Being on this campus once again — that feeling, it don’t get no better than that,” Anthony said

The former Syracuse forward scored 17 points on 5-of-12 shooting, grabbed seven rebounds and dished out two assists in 27 minutes at the same arena where he averaged 22.2 points per game as a freshman.

For Carter-Williams, a return to Syracuse meant a return to Insomnia Cookies — a brief break from the series of massages, rehab exercises and upper-body workouts that have become his life as he tries to get back to contact drills and eventually playing.

He also stopped by the Knicks star’s namesake building, the Carmelo K. Anthony Center, on Tuesday to hang out with SU assistant coaches Gerry McNamara, Mike Hopkins and Adrian Autry. He also said hello to Jim Boeheim.

Grant stopped by, too. He saw his old tutors and teammates, just some of the people he said he misses the most at SU.

When he walked onto the Dome floor, he remembered beating Duke 91-89 in front of a record crowd of 35,446 on Feb. 1. He scored 24 points and snagged 12 rebounds that day. But on Tuesday, he just studied players in his position.

“I’m a competitive player, so obviously I want to be on the court, especially in an environment like Syracuse, coming back to basically what was my second home,” Grant said. “Being able to play here would be tremendous, but at the same time I just got to get through my injury.”

He didn’t shoot in the 76ers’ morning shootaround. Carter-Williams dribbled and shot, but still isn’t participating in any contact drills. Both had told teammate Jakarr Sampson, formerly of St. John’s, about their favorite games in the Dome and that SU fans “show them a lot of love.”

But the most was saved for Anthony, who took the longest trip down memory lane to SU.

Looking out the window of the Knicks’ team bus on the ride from the Genesee Grande Hotel to the Carrier Dome on Tuesday, Anthony said he saw and remembered his old stomping grounds.

He was just 24 hours removed from a preseason game at Madison Square Garden on Monday, and the Knicks had flown up to Syracuse earlier Tuesday.

But Anthony only played 15 minutes Monday night so he could play more in the Carrier Dome.

Said Anthony: “Any time I can play here, I’m willing to do it.”

Published on October 14, 2014 at 11:01 pm

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