Sixers winning behind Iverson CLEVELAND - The scene kept repeating itself. Allen Iverson scored 40 points and the 76ers lost.  The first seven times Iverson hit 40, the Sixers lost. Five of them occurred late in Iverson's rookie season. The lesson seemed to be that as Iverson was keeping the PA announcer busy, the other Sixers stood around, were relatively easy to defend and, as a result, were relatively easy to beat. The last eight times Iverson's had 40 points, the Sixers picked up six wins (they're 9-11 overall), perhaps leading to the conclusion that Iverson is figuring out how to score within a team-oriented framework. Iverson's supporting cast is certainly better than the groups that went 22-60 and 31-51 in his first two years. Iverson turned in his third 40-point game in the last four outings with a career-high 54 on 20-for-30 shooting in Saturday's 107-103 win at Cleveland.  The Sixers won all three of them. "A.I. carried the whole team pretty much," said forward Tyrone Hill. "The most important thing was we got the win." Iverson agreed. "The most important thing for me is to just get a win, regardless of if I don't play well," Iverson said. "As long as I come out of here with a win, that's where I get satisfaction from." Iverson also helped out at the defensive end with two key steals down the stretch. He left his feet under the basket on each, one time bouncing the ball off a Cleveland player to give the Sixers possession and knocking it to George Lynch on the other. "He made two great, unbelievable defensive plays, coming back and getting steals and keeping the ball in play," head coach Larry Brown said. "He was phenomenal. You can't say enough about him." Iverson may succeed teammate Aaron McKie as NBA Player of the Week with the numbers he put up in the three victories. He averaged 37.7 points, 4.3 assists, 2.3 steals, 40 minutes, shot 42 for 78 (53.8 percent) from the field and was 25 for 30 from the foul line in the three games. The high field-goal percentage is probably the most encouraging number for Iverson and the 24-8 Sixers. He's spent nearly the entire season below 40 percent. The recent surge, which has included an unusual number of jumpers, pushed him to 41.6 percent this year, to go along with a career-best 81.7 percent from the line.  "I'm just playing a little better than I have been," said Iverson, who leads all Eastern Conference guards in all-star balloting. "In the beginning of the year, I was struggling so much.  "It's kind of frustrating for me because I'm the type of player who can break out of a slump real fast. For the first time in my career, it didn't happen that way. I feel good about it because I was playing bad and we were winning. My big thing was I felt I had to learn how to play struggling.  "Through the times I was struggling, I was learning how to play and still be able to win. Just because I'm not hitting shots, there's so many things you can do on the court with your defense, steals, rebounds and assists. That's the way I approached my slump." Iverson has the statistics to support the belief that he's having his best all-around season. The NBA-leading Sixers have the record to back it up, too.  Besides being fourth in the NBA in scoring with a 27.4-point average, he's third in steals (2.29), sixth in minutes (41) and 24th in assists (4.8). "A lot of credit has to go to my teammates and the coaching staff," Iverson said. "Without them, none of this would be possible."		Author Tom Moore   Source Phillyburbs   Return to Articles