Philadelphia 76ers MVP has high-hopes for team
Allen Iverson has high hopes for The Philadelphia 76ers winning the Atlantic Division title. Acquiring All-Star forward Chris Webber from the Sacramento Kings could help make it happen.By DAN GELSTON
The Associated Press
PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 23 - Fresh off his MVP performance in the All-Star game, Allen Iverson has visions of hoisting another trophy over his head - the one NBA champions get.
Forget that the Philadelphia 76ers would barely qualify for the Eastern Conference playoffs right now or that there's a chance they wouldn't have home-court advantage in the first round even if they won the Atlantic Division.
Despite all that, Iverson keeps saying the Sixers are good enough to be contenders.
"All we've got to do is get in the playoffs in a seven-game series and anything can happen," Iverson said Tuesday. "We can beat anyone in the league."
Four years after Iverson led the team to the NBA Finals, the Sixers (26-27) are hoping he can just get them to the postseason. They rebounded from a slow start under first-year coach Jim O'Brien to win 20 of their last 35 games, slid into the eighth spot in the conference and are only one game behind the Atlantic Division-leading Boston Celtics.
Win the division and they're automatically in the postseason. If not, the Sixers just have to hope that mediocrity is good enough to earn them a playoff berth. The Sixers would have to go 16-13 in their final 29 games - starting Thursday at New York - to finish with a winning record.
"We are a team that can finish .500 or above and I believe that we're a team that can make the playoffs," O'Brien said. Maybe, but the Sixers might have to make some changes, and with the trade deadline at 3 p.m. EST Thursday, team president Billy King is talking trade. The Sixers, though, don't have much to offer.
King certainly would look for the right deal - ideally one that would ship out Glenn Robinson and bring back a 3-point shooter or some frontcourt help - but he made a steadfast commitment to keeping the young nucleus intact.
"We're not going to move any of our young players," King said Tuesday.
Philadelphia needs some defensive help, too. The Sixers are 22nd in the league in points allowed (99.6), are getting outrebounded by nearly 1 1/2 a game and teams are shooting 44 percent against them.
"If there's anything we need, it's definitely a big man," said Iverson, the NBA's leading scorer. "A big man would help us a lot, especially a big man that can rebound and block shots."
After months of shuffling the lineup with mixed results, O'Brien has settled on a lineup of Iverson, Kyle Korver, Andre Iguodala, Kenny Thomas and Samuel Dalembert.
Korver, the team's top 3-point shooter, Iguodala, Dalembert and Willie Green appear off-limits for any team looking to make a trade.
O'Brien said Tuesday he hoped to stick with his current lineup now that he has a better grasp of what each player can do and how he can better utilize them.
"That's the one I'm comfortable with at this point in time," O'Brien said. "It took longer than I had preferred. We were able to give all of the young guys a lot of playing time in key roles in order to see how they handled themselves."
The Sixers also would like to play better at home, where they're 15-10. Of the teams ahead of them, only Chicago has double-digit losses at home and three teams have won at least 20 home games.
"We need to establish a home-court presence and make it difficult for teams to come to the Wachovia Center," O'Brien said.
Home-court may not help them in the playoffs, though. If the Sixers win the Atlantic Division and earn the third seed, they could play on the sixth-seed's court if that team has a better record.
If the Sixers stay where they are and finish second in the division and eighth in the conference, they would play at the site of the No. 1 seed, which Miami has all but wrapped up.
Before Iverson called Heat center Shaquille O'Neal the greatest player of all time at the All-Star game, he had a not-so-friendly warning for his friend if they played each other in the playoffs.
"He already knows he's going to have a lot of problems with me and my teammates," Iverson said, smiling.
Iverson said the Sixers would be tough no matter who they played.
"Guys are going to have problems with us anyway," Iverson said. "We get in any series, I don't think any of those guys want to play the Sixers."
The Sixers just hope to get the chance.
Story Produced by: Medha Raval
