We know why Basketball Wives was created.
Shaunie Henderson, the creator of the popular reality TV show that followed the everyday lives of wives married to NBA stars, recently shared what led to the creation. Henderson, who married NBA legend Shaquille O'Neal in 2002 shared that her divorce was the reason behind creating the show.
In a conversation with Not My Best Moment with KevOnStage, Henderson explained, “I was divorcing, and nobody knew it. But I was preparing to divorce and I just didn't have any stability.”
She added that she thought that her first marriage would last “forever,” but she and O'Neal finalized their divorce in 2011.
“I literally left my marriage with nothing but hopes that things would be OK until a judge said it would be OK,” Henderson said. “Basketball Wives was actually developed during that time of just like, ‘Something's got to work.’”
Basketball Wives premiered in 2010, and during the thought process of the show, she compared it to the popular family reality series, Keeping Up With The Kardashians, which started in 2007.
“I saw the Kardashians. I'm like, ‘How hard is this?’” Henderson said. “And people would always come and ask like, ‘What do you guys do as wives? Do you guys all hang out together? What do you do every day?’”
Basketball Wives was on air for 12 seasons and had its last episode in July 2025.
The four-time NBA champion and Henderson share four children together. O'Neal has not yet remarried, but Henderson walked down the aisle again in 2022 to Pastor Keion Henderson. The Los Angeles Lakers alum has been open about his faults in their marriage in past.
“I had two perfect women, and I messed it up,” the former center said to TODAY in 2023. “My first one was my baby mother, Arnetta (Yardbourgh), and then I met Shaunie (Nelson). Shaunie was also a perfect woman, and I messed it up.”
“We were young and always just doing dumb stuff. But the good thing about our relationship is (that) they forgave me, and we have a good relationship now,” he went on to add. “But when you ask me about the perfect woman, I had two perfect women, and I messed it up just by, you know, being dumb.”
