Shaunie O’Neal has been happily engaged to Pastor Keion Henderson since Nov. 2021, but don’t expect to see him on Basketball Wives when the show returns to VH1 on May 16! “I would not bring him on Basketball Wives,” Shaunie laughed during an EXCLUSIVE interview with HollywoodLife. “I wouldn’t even ask him to do that. Don’t do it, sir! I will share him, just not on the show.”
Fans have actually been buzzing that Shaunie and Keion may have their own wedding special that will be televised, but she wouldn’t confirm or deny the rumors. “I keep hearing that buzz,” she teased. “There might be…maybe!” Shaunie also confirmed that she and Keion have set a wedding date, but said she’s not sharing it at the time.
Shaunie is going into her new marriage with five kids — she shares four children with Shaquille O’Neal, and has a son from another previous relationship, as well. Luckily, the kids have an incredible relationship with Keion. “They love him,” Shaunie gushed. “They have their own relationship with him. It’s actually awesome to watch and makes me love him even more. They love him so much and he loves them so much. It’s just so perfect. Not one of them has a problem with him or is disconnected. They have a group text and their own individual ones going on. The connection warms my heart. It’s a package deal with five kids, so it was just perfect.”
On season 10 of Basketball Wives, Shaunie remains and executive producer, but will only be appearing on the show as a “Friend,” as opposed to a main cast member. “I needed a breather,” she admitted. “I just have this new chapter in life. I moved to a whole different state, my kids are here, my man is here. I just needed to kind of be in this space without the distraction of shooting an entire season or show over X amount of months. I just wanted to be in my happy space. Not that [filming] isn’t a happy space, but it’s a distracting space, let’s say that. I just wanted to be focused on my life and what was going on and all the goodness of it.”
Shaunie teased that viewers will see more “personal storylines” on this season of the show. “There will be heavy moments, but heavy in a different way. It’s heavy, unavoidable moments — or life decision-type moments that are heavy,” she explained. “I think they’re more relatable. I guess our previous heaviness was a different kind of relatable, but there are personal stories. Not anything that was brought to [the cast] from somebody else from the cast. This was life happening.”
New episodes of Basketball Wives air Mondays at 8:00 p.m. on VH1.
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