Carmelo Anthony Gave Syracuse Players a Pump-up Speech Before Terrible Performance in Season Opener
The Syracuse Orange took the floor for their season opener Wednesday night in an ACC battle against No. 11 Virginia.
Right before heading out to the court, former Syracuse basketball legend, Carmelo Anthony, gave an inspirational speech to pump up his guys.
Carmelo Anthony Gives Pump Up Speech to Syracuse Basketball Before Historic Loss https://t.co/BW7rVmvvNx
— TMZ (@TMZ) November 7, 2019
The team was super fired up after Melo's motivation, so you'd expect them to go out there and put on a show, right? Instead, they did the exact opposite.
FINAL: Virginia 48, Syracuse 34
— Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanHoops) November 7, 2019
This was even uglier than anyone imagined.
Yikes. The Orange scored an abysmal 34 points on 24 percent shooting. Melo, a known go-to scorer back in college and also the NBA, couldn't have been happy with the putrid offensive performance from his former team. This is a guy who averaged a tick over 22 points-per-game is his lone season with the Orange.
To put it in even worse perspective, UNC freshman Cole Anthony scored as many points as the whole team in his season debut for the Heels against Notre Dame.
Yep, Cole Anthony and Syracuse each scored 34 points tonight.
— The Athletic CBB (@TheAthleticCBB) November 7, 2019
While Melo is still looking for a long-term gig in the NBA in hopes of closing his career in respectful fashion, Anthony's pregame pep talk definitely didn't do the job for Cuse. While ironic, it's impossible to blame Anthony for such transgressions.