Shaquille O'Neal helped catch a hit-and-run suspect early Sunday morning.

O'Neal and bodyguard Jerome Crawford had just returned from an away game in Chicago.

They were outside Crawford's Coconut Grove home unloading luggage when a car, driven by Emmnueo Cibrin, 18, veered into O'Neal's parked 2007 Cadillac Escalade.

O'Neal and his bodyguard saw Cibrin leaving the scene, and leapt into the damaged SUV to give chase. They tailed Cibrin and passenger Junior Rondon for about five minutes before catching up with the two Tampa friends near Southwest 17th Avenue and Coral Way.

Rondon said he and Cibrin had just left an area nightclub when they struck the open driver-side door of a black Cadillac Escalade parked in the street. Cibrin kept driving, Rondon said, but with good reason.

''He was going to stop, but then we saw the Escalade chasing us,'' Rondon told The Miami Herald on Sunday. ``We got scared and kept driving, you know?''