Anthony Bennett Canadian Basketball Player Born in 1993

Early life

Anthony Bennett was born on 14 March 1993 and grew up in the Toronto area of Ontario, Canada. He attended Harold M. Brathwaite Secondary School in Brampton. At 16 he moved to the United States to play for Mountain State Academy in West Virginia, and when that school closed a year later he transferred to Findlay Prep, a basketball preparatory academy in Henderson, Nevada. Recruiting services ranked him among the top forwards and top seven players of the class of 2012. He chose the University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV), committing to the school in May 2012.

Career

Bennett spent one season with the UNLV Runnin' Rebels in 2012-13, playing 35 games, mostly as a power forward. He averaged 16.1 points and 8.1 rebounds in about 27 minutes a game and shot 37.5 percent from three-point range. UNLV reached the NCAA tournament and lost in the first round. In April 2013 he declared for the NBA draft, giving up his remaining college eligibility.

In the 2013 draft the Cleveland Cavaliers selected him first overall, the first time a Canadian had gone with the top pick. He signed a two-year rookie contract that August. His first double-figure scoring game came in January 2014, when he had 15 points and 8 rebounds against the New Orleans Pelicans, and he recorded his first double-double the next month with 19 points and 10 rebounds against the Sacramento Kings. He played 52 games that season, averaging 4.2 points and 3.0 rebounds.

In August 2014 he was traded to the Minnesota Timberwolves as part of a three-team deal. There he scored a career-high 20 points against the San Antonio Spurs in November 2014 and, over 57 games, averaged 5.2 points and 3.8 rebounds, his best season averages in the NBA. The Timberwolves waived him through a contract buyout in September 2015.

Bennett then signed with his hometown Toronto Raptors. In December 2015 he asked to be assigned to the Raptors' development team, Raptors 905, and became the first number-one overall pick to play in the NBA's developmental league. The Raptors waived him in March 2016. He signed with the Brooklyn Nets that July, made his debut for the club on 29 October with nine points off the bench, and recorded a career-high 14 rebounds against the Milwaukee Bucks in December. He spent short spells with the Nets' affiliate, the Long Island Nets, before Brooklyn waived him in January 2017.

Days later he signed with Fenerbahçe in Turkey. He played ten EuroLeague games, averaging 1.2 points, and the club won its first EuroLeague title in 2017 by beating Olympiacos 80-64 in the final. He was released in May. In autumn 2017 he signed with the Phoenix Suns, but was waived before the season began, and he went on to play in the NBA G League through 2018 and 2019 with several clubs, including a trade in October 2018. His recorded teams from this period include the Maine Celtics, the Motor City Cruise and the San Diego Clippers. In July 2019 he signed with the Houston Rockets and was waived that October.

He later played abroad. In 2021 he joined Cangrejeros de Santurce in Puerto Rico, then Hapoel Jerusalem in Israel, where he scored 22 points in his debut in October 2021 and averaged 6.3 points in eight games before being waived in January 2022. In February 2022 he joined the Kaohsiung Steelers in Taiwan's P. League+, followed by the Hsinchu JKO Lioneers in 2022-23. In August 2023 he signed with the Goyang Sono Skygunners of the Korean Basketball League, but left before the season began. He signed with the Formosa Dreamers of Taiwan's TPBL in December 2024 and was released in March 2025. In April 2025 he joined Al-Najma of the Bahraini Premier League.

Recognition

Bennett played for Canada's youth teams, helping the country win bronze medals at the 2009 FIBA Americas Under-16 Championship and the 2010 FIBA Under-17 World Championship. At the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto he averaged 15.6 points and 10.4 rebounds as Canada won the silver medal, losing the final to Brazil after beating the United States in the semi-final. Later, in November 2017, he left his G League club briefly to join the Canadian senior team for a World Cup qualifying window.

On draft night he was compared with the former UNLV star Larry Johnson. Counting the NBA, he played for the Cavaliers, Timberwolves, Raptors and Nets over four seasons, and at 203 cm (6 ft 8 in) he was listed as a power forward.