Bird, Moore, Anthony, Donovan top '25 Basketball Hall of Fame class - ESPN

Carmelo Anthony and Dwight Howard are going into the Basketball Hall of Fame later this year, not once but twice. LeBron James and Chris Paul are part of the group that's headed to the Hall as well, even before their playing careers end.

Anthony and Howard were announced Saturday as members of the Class of 2025, as was the 2008 U.S. Olympic men's basketball team they played on — dubbed the «Redeem Team» — that captured gold at the Beijing Games and started a run of five consecutive Olympic titles and counting for USA Basketball's men's program.

Also selected for enshrinement: WNBA greats Sue Bird, Maya Moore and Sylvia Fowles; Chicago Bulls coach and two-time NCAA champion Billy Donovan; Miami Heat managing general partner Micky Arison and longtime NBA referee Danny Crawford.

«I made it to the real basketball heaven,» Howard said. «It's crazy.»

Enshrinement weekend is Sept. 5-6 at Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut, and the Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts.

«When the call comes and, in my case, I saw Springfield on the phone,» Anthony said on the televised announcement, «You know what time it is [when] Springfield is on the phone. You know who it is. You get the phone call, and you hear, 'You're in.' And I think for me, it was a burden off of my shoulders.»

The UConn women's program already had coach Geno Auriemma, Swin Cash (enshrined as a player) and Rebecca Lobo (enshrined as a contributor) in the Hall of Fame, and Bird and Moore going in together will add to what's always a huge weekend in New England.

«They're Hall of Famers for me, they're Hall of Famers for their family, they're Hall of Famers for everybody. They're even Hall of Famers for UConn haters,» Auriemma said. «That's one thing they can all