Heart trophy is his CHANGES INSIDE LED IVERSON ON MVP TRACK SOMETIMES, EVEN within special moments, there is a moment to remember. That happened yesterday toward the end of the announcement that Sixers guard Allen Iverson had won the Maurice Podoloff Trophy as the 2000-01 NBA Most Valuable Player. Sixers coach Larry Brown stopped talking in midsentence to the journalists gathered at the Adam's Mark Hotel and began speaking directly to his 6-foot, 165-pound star. "I'm really proud to have had the opportunity to coach Allen, and I never thought I'd say that,'' Brown said while turning his attention from the crowd to Iverson. "I'm so proud of what you've done." Brown said that upon hearing what Georgetown coach John Thompson said in a recorded interview about Iverson's past struggles, "I don't think it really hit home until I heard him say what you've had to overcome to win this award." "I know how proud your teammates are of you," Brown continued. "And to hear what you said about your friends, that just tells me a great deal about who you are, and I'm proud of you.'' Think about where the Sixers were a year ago - a few days from being eliminated from the playoffs by the Indiana Pacers. Think about where they were last summer - in disarray as Brown, frustrated to the limit, tried his best to engineer a trade to get Iverson out of Philadelphia and his life. Now tonight, the Sixers will host the Toronto Raptors in a pivotal Game 5 of the Eastern Conference semifinals. Iverson has joined Wilt Chamberlain, Julius Erving and Moses Malone to become the fourth Sixer named MVP. And while Iverson sincerely thanked his family, friends, teammates and coaches for helping him reach this pinnacle, the bottom line is that it probably would not have happened without the changes he made inside. All the Sixers' success and all of Iverson's accolades can be attributed to Iverson looking at himself, not just deciding where he wanted to go, but accepting what he had to do to get there. "With everything that went on during the summer, the only thing I thought about coming into this season was winning the NBA championship,'' said Iverson, the shortest and lightest MVP in NBA history. "I felt that for me to turn everything around, I had to push myself to win a championship. "I didn't start with the other guys on the team. I started with myself first. I always told [Sixers guard Aaron McKie], because he's the person I talk to all of the time. I told him it was going to be important for me to become a professional, like he is, day in and day out. "Watching [McKie] helped me become more of a professional. I always looked at basketball as just a game, the NBA as just a game. I found out the hard way that it is a business and a profession, but at least I did recognize it before it was too late.'' When a trade to the Detroit Pistons fell through and Iverson was embarrassed that he was nearly shipped out of the only place he wanted to play, for reasons that had little to do with his basketball abilities, Iverson vowed to change. He promised the missed practices and insubordination would no longer be an issue. But simply saying so would not be good enough anymore. This time Iverson had to do it. Considering the eight ball Iverson began this season behind, totaling 1,121 points and receiving 93 of a possible 124 first-place votes in balloting by sports writers and broadcasters speak volumes of what Iverson did. This award wasn't about Iverson leading the league in scoring or even the Sixers winning 56 games to post the best record in the Eastern Conference. Allen Iverson's winning the MVP award is affirmation of the human spirit's ability to grow, adapt and mature. "I just tried to look in the mirror and work on the things that I wasn't doing right as a person and a ballplayer,'' Iverson said. "I made a promise to myself that after the season I would look in that same mirror and be able to say that I did everything that I could. Regardless of whether we win the championship or not, I had to be able to say I did everything it took to try and win a championship. If I could do that, then I could live with everything else. It was important for me to try and be a better person and player.'' Once Iverson showed Brown he was sincere about taking the first step, the old-school coach decided to walk with him. The road isn't smooth. It will never be. But the only important thing is that both gave enough to make this relationship work. "We went through a lot this summer,'' Iverson said. "It showed a lot about coach Brown and myself. "For one time in my career, I stepped back and tried to listen to and understand someone else. He did the same thing instead of trying to arm-wrestle me all of the time. I always told him I wanted to have the type of relationship Michael Jordan and Phil Jackson had. It might not be the same relationship, then again, it might be better. "What I do know is I can look in his eye and he can look in my eye and we have the same thing. We have the same agenda on our minds.'' *		Author John Smallwood   Source Daily News   Return to Articles