Amar’e Stoudemire was on a plane returning from the West Coast yesterday morning when he got a call from Carmelo Anthony, saying he was coming to the Knicks.
“We both were just excited, and couldn’t wait [to play together],” Stoudemire said of his superstar friend.
Stoudemire said their conversation was brief, because he was on a plane, but added that when Anthony arrived in New York, Stoudemire would give him advice on places to live as well as “great places to eat.”
Stoudemire said he is ready to share the Garden court with his fellow high-scoring forward.
“It’s going to be great,” he said. “It’s going to be fun.”
The duo, who are two years apart in age (Anthony is 26, Stoudemire 28), have known each other since they were in high school. They met as teenagers and participated in celebrated prep exhibition games.
“I was the top player in the country,” he said. “Melo was I think two or three,” Stoudemire said. “I went to the NBA out of high school. Carmelo went to Syracuse. I got Rookie of the Year. He won a national championship.
“We kind of grew up in the same era,” he said. “And we took the league by storm as young athletes, young players. To team up with him now on the bigger stage, here in New York, is something special.”
Stoudemire and Anthony played together on the 2004 Olympic team, when they won a bronze medal, and on three Western Conference All-Star teams. Last summer, Stoudemire was a guest at Anthony’s wedding, where along with Hornets point guard Chris Paul, they made their toast that they would play together in New York.
Stoudemire said yesterday that upon signing with the Knicks last summer, he, team president Donnie Walsh and owner James Dolan “talked about building a championship-caliber team.”
Stoudemire said Dolan was the one who informed him of the trade Monday night, and that he and the owner had been in touch regularly about the inner workings of the Anthony deal.
“We had communicated back and forth,” Stoudemire said. “One thing that we talked about when I first signed with New York was to keep a line of communication open, because the goal is to build a championship-caliber team. So he pretty much kept me in the loop. He called and told me that the deal was final and told me the deal points.”