Allen Iverson was arguably the best pound-for-pound player of all time. At barely six feet tall, Iverson carried the Philadelphia 76ers on his back, night after night, and season after season. In 2001, he led the Sixers to the NBA Finals, where they faced a Los Angeles Lakers team that was given a 95.2% implied probability to win the series.
However, Iverson bucked the odds and put on a show in Game 1 of the 2001 NBA Finals that left everyone, including the Lakers, spellbound. Los Angeles forward Horace Grant recalled A.I.'s exploits during his recent appearance on "Urban Grind TV".
"Much respect to A.I.," said Grant. "That dude, listen, they beat us in the first game. And he shook my dude down, Ty Lue, and then kind of stepped over him after he scored. That was disrespect, but A.I., man, listen, that's not Allen Iverson. That might be Artificial Intelligence, cuz that dude was….yeah, he deserved the MVP that year."
The 2000-01 season was arguably the best in Iverson's legendary career. That season, A.I. was the league's scoring champion with a then-career-high 31.1 points per game. He also led the NBA in steals at 2.8 per game, which was also a career-best for him. The Answer was also selected to the All-Star and All-NBA first teams. However, aside from individual honors, the stars also aligned for the Sixers that season.
Philadelphia finished the regular season with a 56-26 record, and they were the No.1 seed in the Eastern Conference playoff bracket. After routing the Indiana Pacers 3-1 in the first round, the Sixers went through a pair of Game 7s in the second round and conference finals en route to their first Finals appearance since 1983, when they won it all. As expected, Iverson did the heavy lifting.
A.I. averaged 35.6 points, 5.6 rebounds, 3.8 assists, and 1.8 steals per game in the championship series. This included his iconic 48-point performance in Game 1, where the Sixers stunned the Lakers 107-101 in overtime. Although L.A. did a better job of containing him in the succeeding games, Iverson's massive Game 1 effort prevented the Purple & Gold from a clean sweep in the entire postseason.
Two years ago, Shaquille O'Neal admitted that he was mad at Iverson for messing up history. No team in the history of the NBA has swept all of its postseason games on its way to winning the NBA championship. The Lakers were four wins away from becoming the first team to accomplish the feat, but A.I. had other plans.
"I'm upset with him because he messed up history," Shaq said in an interview. "Because the year that we were 14-1, I was so mad and upset I wanted to go 16 and 0 because there was some other stuff going on with some moneys and I was like, okay, 'I'm about to show you that we the best Laker team ever because I get tired of hearing that word that Laker team was better so I'm about to prove the deal'. And like if we would have gone 16-0, we can both say okay, Magic and Kareem ain't go 16-0, you know what I'm saying, like that, so we underestimated him in that first game."
Despite absorbing that Game 1 loss, the 2001 Lakers' 15-1 playoff record stood as the gold standard in the NBA until the 2017 Golden State Warriors went 16-1 in the postseason during Kevin Durant 's first year in the Bay. But yes, there's no question Iverson was spectacular in that series, just as he was all season long that year.
This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Sep 16, 2025, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
