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Okay friends, as promised from this morning’s post, I give you: Spectrotree 2018.

(We haven’t found our tree skirt yet, so just ignore that part.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Update 12/1/2018: We are incredibly amazed and humbled by the response to Spectrotree!We created this as a fun little project, and never imagined how much joy it would bring to so many. Thank you for taking the time to watch it and to send feedback, especially those who spoke of their own memories of the parade. You have truly touched our hearts, and we hope you have a very wonderful holiday season.

(P.s. I know many of you have expressed interest in a “how it’s made” tutorial. That video would be several hours long, so instead, Jeff suggests those of you who are interested in advanced Christmas Light displays can visit www.holidaycoro.com, where he procured many of the materials that we used on Spectrotree.)

Oh, and we did find our tree skirt. :)

Video of the latest Hook-Up featuring Allen Iverson with rappers Malice and Pusha T. ESPN The Magazine

One of the most controversial Basketball players of all time, Allen Iverson is one of the most loved and hated figures in Basketball. Born Allen Ezail Iverson in Hampton, Virginia, he grew up very poor to a struggling mother and a father who deserted him. Growing up, he was very athletic, playing football and basketball throughout most of his education prior to college. Iverson began focusing on basketball at his mother's insistence, despite wanting to be a football player. He proved to be a talented basketball player. At Bethel High School in Newport News, he began his high school basketball career. He developed a reputation of talking a lot and being uncoachable. To say he had a rough childhood is quite an understatement. On one of his places of residence, he walked through knee-deep sewage daily. During one summer, he witnessed the death of almost ten of his closest friends. Iverson first came to the national spotlight in 1993 in a controversial incident surrounding violent events at a bowling alley in Newport News. While the events that happened there will never be fully known, the generally accepted story is that some white students got into an argument with Iverson and his friends. The first question surrounding the event is whether he started it or if the white kids started it. Also, the question surrounded whether or not he assaulted a white woman by hitting her over the head with a chair. The prosecution insisted that surveillance tapes undoubtedly showed Iverson was the culprit, but in reality the tapes showed nothing conclusive. Two factors did him in at his hearing; first of all, two white people said they saw him assault the girl. Secondly, the judge was from the very conservative southeast Virginia establishment and did not have any sympathy for Iverson, his background or his talent. Seeing that Iverson requested a bench trial, this was crucial to his case. To add fuel to the fire, Allen Iverson flew in for the weekend from a tournament to be in Virginia for his trial. This played into the prosecution's hands and also upset the judge, both of whom saw this as evidence that Iverson did not respect the law. He was sentenced to a 5 -year jail term. This case sparked a tremendous amount of national attention. The case caught the interest of Bill Cosby and Spike Lee, who would be a fan and advocate of Iverson for many years. People all around the Newport News area started a movement to free Allen Iverson. He spent only four months in jail. Governor Douglas Wilder pardoned him. This move all but ended his political career and sparked another controversy. Wilder was also black, and white voters in Virginia viewed this move in a very racist light. Iverson was viewed now in much of white America as essentially a convicted felon who was out of prison only because a black man was governor of his state. Iverson got out conditionally, however. He had to adhere to a curfew and could not play basketball until he got his high school diploma. He could not accept a scholarship to the University of Kentucky but did get a scholarship once he completed his high school education in a learning center. During this time, he received his nickname, the answer. He was called such because his friends said he was the answer to basketball's conformity so to speak, people that conformed to this family friendly image, such as Charles Barkley, Isiah Thomas and most importantly, Michael Jordan, who was a childhood hero of his. He accepted a scholarship to Georgetown where John Thompson coached him. Thompson became somewhat of a father figure to him, but he was hard to manage, and the two had a workable but very turbulent relationship. Iverson completed only two years of his education where he became the top NBA draft pick in 1996. He was drafted by the ailing Philadelphia 76ers in 1996. Iverson is immersed in hip-hop culture. This made him an incredibly controversial figure in basketball. His clothing looked more like a gangster rappers than it did Michael Jordan's. On the court he seemed to embody the gangster rapper's image. He had an arm covering on one arm when he played, and also was one of the first players to have cornrows; a hairstyle up until that time was popular in prison. To make matters worse, he had an incredibly "in your face" style, which did not sit well with older players like Charles Barkley, Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and others. Jordan said of him when Jordan's Bulls played Iverson's 76ers, that he had no respect for the game. Despite this, no one denied Iverson's talent. He could hustle the ball, could get around even the tallest players. He became known for his fast drives to the baskets and his ability to fake the ball in a move called the crossover. Spike Lee lost respect for him when he turned down his invitation to star in the film He Got Game (1998). As a very pointed move, Lee cast former collegiate rival Ray Allen in the part. The Sixers found themselves suddenly a respectable team. They acquired a new coach, the unusual Larry Brown. As a player in the ABA almost twenty years ago, Brown was also a young outsider fighting the system. Larry Brown now was a button-down-suit-and-tie coach. The two did not get along well at first; in fact, their relationship at best was serviceable. Brown was always unhappy with Iverson for not showing up to practice. Iverson insisted his game was pure inspiration, and he had little need for practice. The two rarely saw eye to eye. He received a tremendous number of awards in his short career. He was named rookie of the year in 1997, and on more than one occasion, he was an All NBA First Team, NBA All Star, was an All Star MVP, and received perhaps what was his crowning achievement to date when he was NBA MVP in 2001. That year, Iverson led his team to the NBA finals, but had a rough ride against Kobe Bryant and 'Shaquille ONeal's Lakers. They lost the championship in game five of the series. It was still quite an achievement because the Sixers had not been to the finals since Dr. J (Julius Erving) and Moses Malone led them to victory over the Lakers in 1983 in a 4-0 sweep. Iverson has over 20 tattoos. Each tattoo is a symbol of his life. One denotes the name of his group of friends he has known since childhood, Cru Thik, another who says the answer, another who is dedicated to his mom who is a strong presence as Sixers games, and many others. He married his high school sweetheart Tawanna Turner and they have two children.

Won the gold medal at World University Games with the US Team in 1995.

Named Big East Rookie of the Year 1995
Named Big East Defensive Player of the Year 1995, 1996.

1st pick in NBA Draft 1996

Was named MVP of the 2000-01 NBA season.

Attended Georgetown University from 1994 to 1996 where he was coached by the legendary John Thompson.

Drafted first overall by the Philadelphia 76ers in 96.

Rookie of the Year 1997.
NBA Rookie 1st Team 1997.
Rookie All-star game MVP in 1997.

NBA All Star 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007.

All Star Game MVP 2001, 2005.

NBA MVP 2001.(Shortest MVP in MVP history)

All NBA First Team 1999, 2000, 2001, 2005.

In 2001, Led the 76ers to their first NBA Finals appearance since 1983 (lost to the LA Lakers in 5 games).

Played for Georgetown University.

Played Quarterback in HS and led his school to state titles in football and basketball his senior year.

Under lifetime contract with Reebok.

Daughter Tiaura (b. 1995), son Allen II, or "Deuce" (b. 1998).

Led the Bethel High School Bruins (Hampton, Virginia) to the 1993 basketball and football state championship; the then-16 year old played point guard and quarterback.

Released a rap album, Slow Motion, with appearances by his friends Ma$e, Jermaine Dupri, Da Brat and Kool-G-Rap.

Georgetown University's all-time leading scorer.

Named after his father, Allen Broughton, who left the family and never married Iverson's mother.

Since 1998, he has hosted the Allen Iverson Celebrity Classic to benefit the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Hampton Roads, Virginia.

Lives on the same street as M. Night Shyamalan.

Wife Tawanna, gave birth to their 3rd child, Isaiah Rahsaan Iverson, the baby weighted 7 lbs. and was born at 9:30 A.M. on August 8, 2003.

He founded the Crossover Foundation.

Allen's third child, son Isaiah Rahsaan, was named for Isiah Thomas and the late Rahsaan Langford, Allen Iverson's close friend who was shot to death in October 2001.

Olympic Bronze Medalist (2004 - Basketball).

He and wife Tawanna welcomed their fourth child, daughter Messiah Lauren Iverson on August 16, 2005 at 11:47 AM, weighing 6 lbs, 12 ounces.

Currently playing for the Denver Nuggets

For those who were there at McDonough Gymnasium on August 4, 1994, few will forget the arrival of a 6-0 freshman guard who needed no introduction. The rumors of Allen Iverson's arrival to the Kenner Summer League were true, and by game's end, Iverson had scored 40 points. By the Sunday afternoon final, before an overflow crowd inside the gym and a crowd of those outside who could not get in, Iverson finished a combined 99 point effort in three days against some of the best collegiate talent in the city. This, of course, from a player that had not played organized basketball in over a year.

The Allen Iverson years had begun.

A brief profile can't do justice to tell the story of one of the greatest pure athletes ever to attend Georgetown, a man without peer in his talent over two years at the collegiate level. Just a year before his Kenner debut, few would have imagined Allen Iverson ever playing college basketball.

Iverson was not only a 31 point a game guard for Bethel HS, but a football player of tremendous skill. As a quarterback and defensive back his sophomore season, he produced nearly 1,600 yards offense and 13 INT's. By his junior year, he accounted for 2,204 yards, 21 touchdowns by rush or interception, and 14 touchdown passes. In a region which has produced NFL quarterbacks such as Michael Vick and Aaron Brooks, there are those who will still say "Bubbachuck" Iverson was better than both of them. Schools such as Arkansas, Kentucky, Duke, and three dozen other top programs across two sports were vying for perhaps the greatest two-sport star the Tidewater had ever produced.

When he led Bethel to the state title, someone asked what it was like to win the title. "I'm going to get one in basketball now," which he did. In late February, 1993, en route to the state title he had promised, Iverson was one of a large group of Bethel teammates at a Hampton bowling alley when a fight broke out between students from rival schools trading racial insults. Three people were hurt in the aftermath. Despite conflicting testimony from eyewitnesses and no clear evidence linking him to the crime, Iverson was one of four black students arrested.

Racial tensions were heightened when the prosecutors passed on a misdemeanor assault charge and charged Iverson with three counts of felony "maiming by mob", which carried a 20 year prison sentence. Despite video evidence which did not place Iverson in the crowd at the time of the fight, he was convicted in a racially charged case.

The 20 year sentence was later reduced to five, and Iverson was granted clemency by Gov. Douglas Wilder three months later, sending Iverson to a detention program at an alternative high school. (The original charges were thrown out by the Virginia court of appeals in 1995.)

In the spring of 1994, with Iverson still in detention, his mother approached John Thompson with a plea to help her son get to college and start a new chapter of his life. Though Thompson had passed on a number of troubled players in the past, he offered Iverson a scholarship in April of that season, contingent upon his completion of high school and his legal release, which was granted 48 hours before his Kenner debut.

By his debut in a Georgetown uniform in November 1994, Iverson had been the subject of intense national media attention. In the Hoyas' annual exhibition with Fort Hood, Iverson scored 36 points, five assists, and three steals in 23 minutes. Local columnists were in awe.

"Hang his number up in the rafters," wrote Tom Knott of the Washington Times. "He's better than most of the point guards in the NBA right now."

"I saw Lew Alcindor, Austin Carr, Moses Malone, Alonzo Mourning, Albert King, Ralph Sampson and Patrick Ewing play in high school," said the Post's Thomas Boswell. "Now, I have two memories on my first impression top shelf. The man who became Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Allen Iverson."

Iverson opened the 1994-95 season in Memphis, TN in a 97-79 loss to defending NCAA champion Arkansas, scoring 19 points. Six days later, he scored 31 in a nationally televised game with DePaul, followed by 30 four days later against Providence, leading the team in scoring 22 times that season. His only game under double figures for the season (and his career) was a game where he played only ten minutes in a loss at Villanova, a game Georgetown coach John Thompson threatened to forfeit when a group of Villanova students paraded through the Spectrum in black and white-striped prison garb, with a sign comparing Iverson to O.J. Simpson.

"You accept certain ribbing, but there is a line," Thompson said after the game. "I can condone any Christian university sitting and watching that happen...If that happens [again], I going to walk. It that simple." Such fan behavior was not seen thereafter.

Later in the season, with President Bill Clinton in attendance, Iverson scored 26 as the Hoyas routed Villanova, 77-52. He followed it up with 21 to beat Syracuse, 28 versus St. John's, 31 in a Big East tournament opener with Miami (a game that saw Iverson outscore the entire Hurricane team at the end of the first half), and 27 versus Connecticut in the semis. In the NCAA regional, he scored 24 in the loss, but held Jeff McInnis to 1 for 8 shooting. By season's end, Allen Iverson had been named Big East Player of the Week nine times, Rookie of the Year, a second team all-conference selection, and honorable mention All-America recipient. Having led the Hoyas in points and steals en route to the school's first NCAA regional appearance since 1989, Iverson was already a star. By 1996, he would become nothing less than a sensation.

The leaser of a talented team that featured four future NBA stars, Allen Iverson dominated the 1995-96 season as no Hoya has done before or since. Adept at the crossover dribble that became his NBA trademark, lightning quick to the basket, and able to score on opponents at will, Iverson was largely unstoppable. Even more impressive was an effort to improve his shooting touch, for despite averaging 20.4 points as a freshman in 1994-95 (2nd all time for a Georgetown rookie), Iverson only shot 39 percent from the field, 23 percent from three, and 19 percent from three in Big East play. For his sophomore season, his field shooting increased to 48 percent, his three point mark to 36 percent. The results were striking.

In the pre-season NIT versus Temple, Iverson shot 50 percent for 24 points and a career high 10 rebounds. After a 23 point effort against Georgia Tech, he scored a career high 40 against Arizona, one of two 40+ point games that season. In Big East play, Iverson could ring up points with ease, such as the game where he scored 21 points in only 20 minutes against Rutgers.

In the final three months of the season, Iverson led the team in 21 of the team's 25 games: 40 against Seton Hall, 39 against St. John's, 34 against Providence. He scored 30 in a wild win over Memphis, and followed it up two nights later with 26 in an upset of #3 Connecticut. For the game, Iverson totalled 26 points, 8 steals, and 6 assists, including a soaring dunk past Ray Allen and the Huskies. It was the highest ranked team any Georgetown team had defeated since 1988. His best performance of the season might have been a 37 point, 8 rebound, and three steal effort against #6 ranked Villanova, playing only 27 minutes. The 106-68 win represents the sixth largest margin of victory and the largest margin ever by a Georgetown team against a top 10 opponent.

Iverson was capable of an off game; unfortunately, two came at particularly inopportune times for the Hoyas' hopes for a national title. Entering the 1996 Big East Final with a #1 seed on the line, Iverson shot 4 for 15 and the Hoyas lost by one, 76-75. As a result of the loss, Georgetown was seeded #2 behind top ranked UMass, and in the regional final between the two teams Iverson struggled with a 6 for 21 effort in the loss. For the season, though, his statistics were astonishing: his 926 points broke the then-record by 124 points. He set new single season marks in field goals, field goal attempts, three pointers, three point attempts, steals, minutes, and scoring average (25.0), the latter of which ranked 7th in the nation that season. The Big East's defensive player of the year, he was named a consensus All-American amidst numerous other awards.

If he could somehow have stayed four years, Iverson undoubtedly would have shredded the Georgetown record books. But whatever hopes existed for Iverson to resist the lure of the NBA were short lived, particularly with the news that one of his sisters had fallen ill. Seeing the opportunity to take care of his family's medical needs, Iverson announced for the NBA draft soon after the end of his sophomore season, becoming the first Georgetown player in the Thompson era to do so. The compact that had bound so many great Hoya players to a four year commitment--from Ewing to Williams, Mourning to Mutombo--had now been broken.

The first pick in the 1996 NBA draft, Iverson signed a $3.9 million contract with the Philadelphia 76ers and a ten year, $50 million deal with Reebok. His effort on the court is well known and respected, but for all the media portrayals of Iverson as the anti-hero, an icon of a "Hip Hop Nation" that ran counter to the NBA's carefully constructed marketing image, or as a symbol of all that is allegedly wrong in professional basketball, he remains remarkably well-grounded.

Married for six years and the father of two, Iverson is fiercely loyal to his teammates and to his childhood friends. He considered it an honor to play for the U.S. Olympic team in 2004 when other NBA stars passed on the offer, and maintains a number of charity events to benefit his local community. In comparison to his NBA career, his years at Georgetown were largely free of the intense media and personal scrutiny, providing at least two years where he could grow as a person as well as a basketball player.

His arrival and exit at Georgetown is still a source of debate in some circles, but his performance on the court is not. Allen Iverson found a home, even briefly, at the Hilltop, and remains one of its brightest stars. "In my heart, I know I'm a basketball player," Iverson said following his 2006 NBA trade, "being that I know I can play with the best of them."

From that first Kenner League game on 1994, no one has doubted it since.

For those who were there at McDonough Gymnasium on August 4, 1994, few will forget the arrival of a 6-0 freshman guard who needed no introduction. The rumors of Allen Iverson's arrival to the Kenner Summer League were true, and by game's end, Iverson had scored 40 points. By the Sunday afternoon final, before an overflow crowd inside the gym and a crowd of those outside who could not get in, Iverson finished a combined 99 point effort in three days against some of the best collegiate talent in the city. This, of course, from a player that had not played organized basketball in over a year.

The Allen Iverson years had begun.

A brief profile can't do justice to tell the story of one of the greatest pure athletes ever to attend Georgetown, a man without peer in his talent over two years at the collegiate level. Just a year before his Kenner debut, few would have imagined Allen Iverson ever playing college basketball.

Iverson was not only a 31 point a game guard for Bethel HS, but a football player of tremendous skill. As a quarterback and defensive back his sophomore season, he produced nearly 1,600 yards offense and 13 INT's. By his junior year, he accounted for 2,204 yards, 21 touchdowns by rush or interception, and 14 touchdown passes. In a region which has produced NFL quarterbacks such as Michael Vick and Aaron Brooks, there are those who will still say "Bubbachuck" Iverson was better than both of them. Schools such as Arkansas, Kentucky, Duke, and three dozen other top programs across two sports were vying for perhaps the greatest two-sport star the Tidewater had ever produced.

When he led Bethel to the state title, someone asked what it was like to win the title. "I'm going to get one in basketball now," which he did. In late February, 1993, en route to the state title he had promised, Iverson was one of a large group of Bethel teammates at a Hampton bowling alley when a fight broke out between students from rival schools trading racial insults. Three people were hurt in the aftermath. Despite conflicting testimony from eyewitnesses and no clear evidence linking him to the crime, Iverson was one of four black students arrested.

Racial tensions were heightened when the prosecutors passed on a misdemeanor assault charge and charged Iverson with three counts of felony "maiming by mob", which carried a 20 year prison sentence. Despite video evidence which did not place Iverson in the crowd at the time of the fight, he was convicted in a racially charged case.

The 20 year sentence was later reduced to five, and Iverson was granted clemency by Gov. Douglas Wilder three months later, sending Iverson to a detention program at an alternative high school. (The original charges were thrown out by the Virginia court of appeals in 1995.)

In the spring of 1994, with Iverson still in detention, his mother approached John Thompson with a plea to help her son get to college and start a new chapter of his life. Though Thompson had passed on a number of troubled players in the past, he offered Iverson a scholarship in April of that season, contingent upon his completion of high school and his legal release, which was granted 48 hours before his Kenner debut.

By his debut in a Georgetown uniform in November 1994, Iverson had been the subject of intense national media attention. In the Hoyas' annual exhibition with Fort Hood, Iverson scored 36 points, five assists, and three steals in 23 minutes. Local columnists were in awe.

"Hang his number up in the rafters," wrote Tom Knott of the Washington Times. "He's better than most of the point guards in the NBA right now."

"I saw Lew Alcindor, Austin Carr, Moses Malone, Alonzo Mourning, Albert King, Ralph Sampson and Patrick Ewing play in high school," said the Post's Thomas Boswell. "Now, I have two memories on my first impression top shelf. The man who became Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and Allen Iverson."

Iverson opened the 1994-95 season in Memphis, TN in a 97-79 loss to defending NCAA champion Arkansas, scoring 19 points. Six days later, he scored 31 in a nationally televised game with DePaul, followed by 30 four days later against Providence, leading the team in scoring 22 times that season. His only game under double figures for the season (and his career) was a game where he played only ten minutes in a loss at Villanova, a game Georgetown coach John Thompson threatened to forfeit when a group of Villanova students paraded through the Spectrum in black and white-striped prison garb, with a sign comparing Iverson to O.J. Simpson.

"You accept certain ribbing, but there is a line," Thompson said after the game. "I can condone any Christian university sitting and watching that happen...If that happens [again], I going to walk. It that simple." Such fan behavior was not seen thereafter.

Later in the season, with President Bill Clinton in attendance, Iverson scored 26 as the Hoyas routed Villanova, 77-52. He followed it up with 21 to beat Syracuse, 28 versus St. John's, 31 in a Big East tournament opener with Miami (a game that saw Iverson outscore the entire Hurricane team at the end of the first half), and 27 versus Connecticut in the semis. In the NCAA regional, he scored 24 in the loss, but held Jeff McInnis to 1 for 8 shooting. By season's end, Allen Iverson had been named Big East Player of the Week nine times, Rookie of the Year, a second team all-conference selection, and honorable mention All-America recipient. Having led the Hoyas in points and steals en route to the school's first NCAA regional appearance since 1989, Iverson was already a star. By 1996, he would become nothing less than a sensation.

The leaser of a talented team that featured four future NBA stars, Allen Iverson dominated the 1995-96 season as no Hoya has done before or since. Adept at the crossover dribble that became his NBA trademark, lightning quick to the basket, and able to score on opponents at will, Iverson was largely unstoppable. Even more impressive was an effort to improve his shooting touch, for despite averaging 20.4 points as a freshman in 1994-95 (2nd all time for a Georgetown rookie), Iverson only shot 39 percent from the field, 23 percent from three, and 19 percent from three in Big East play. For his sophomore season, his field shooting increased to 48 percent, his three point mark to 36 percent. The results were striking.

In the pre-season NIT versus Temple, Iverson shot 50 percent for 24 points and a career high 10 rebounds. After a 23 point effort against Georgia Tech, he scored a career high 40 against Arizona, one of two 40+ point games that season. In Big East play, Iverson could ring up points with ease, such as the game where he scored 21 points in only 20 minutes against Rutgers.

In the final three months of the season, Iverson led the team in 21 of the team's 25 games: 40 against Seton Hall, 39 against St. John's, 34 against Providence. He scored 30 in a wild win over Memphis, and followed it up two nights later with 26 in an upset of #3 Connecticut. For the game, Iverson totalled 26 points, 8 steals, and 6 assists, including a soaring dunk past Ray Allen and the Huskies. It was the highest ranked team any Georgetown team had defeated since 1988. His best performance of the season might have been a 37 point, 8 rebound, and three steal effort against #6 ranked Villanova, playing only 27 minutes. The 106-68 win represents the sixth largest margin of victory and the largest margin ever by a Georgetown team against a top 10 opponent.

Iverson was capable of an off game; unfortunately, two came at particularly inopportune times for the Hoyas' hopes for a national title. Entering the 1996 Big East Final with a #1 seed on the line, Iverson shot 4 for 15 and the Hoyas lost by one, 76-75. As a result of the loss, Georgetown was seeded #2 behind top ranked UMass, and in the regional final between the two teams Iverson struggled with a 6 for 21 effort in the loss. For the season, though, his statistics were astonishing: his 926 points broke the then-record by 124 points. He set new single season marks in field goals, field goal attempts, three pointers, three point attempts, steals, minutes, and scoring average (25.0), the latter of which ranked 7th in the nation that season. The Big East's defensive player of the year, he was named a consensus All-American amidst numerous other awards.

If he could somehow have stayed four years, Iverson undoubtedly would have shredded the Georgetown record books. But whatever hopes existed for Iverson to resist the lure of the NBA were short lived, particularly with the news that one of his sisters had fallen ill. Seeing the opportunity to take care of his family's medical needs, Iverson announced for the NBA draft soon after the end of his sophomore season, becoming the first Georgetown player in the Thompson era to do so. The compact that had bound so many great Hoya players to a four year commitment--from Ewing to Williams, Mourning to Mutombo--had now been broken.

The first pick in the 1996 NBA draft, Iverson signed a $3.9 million contract with the Philadelphia 76ers and a ten year, $50 million deal with Reebok. His effort on the court is well known and respected, but for all the media portrayals of Iverson as the anti-hero, an icon of a "Hip Hop Nation" that ran counter to the NBA's carefully constructed marketing image, or as a symbol of all that is allegedly wrong in professional basketball, he remains remarkably well-grounded.

Married for six years and the father of two, Iverson is fiercely loyal to his teammates and to his childhood friends. He considered it an honor to play for the U.S. Olympic team in 2004 when other NBA stars passed on the offer, and maintains a number of charity events to benefit his local community. In comparison to his NBA career, his years at Georgetown were largely free of the intense media and personal scrutiny, providing at least two years where he could grow as a person as well as a basketball player.

His arrival and exit at Georgetown is still a source of debate in some circles, but his performance on the court is not. Allen Iverson found a home, even briefly, at the Hilltop, and remains one of its brightest stars. "In my heart, I know I'm a basketball player," Iverson said following his 2006 NBA trade, "being that I know I can play with the best of them."

From that first Kenner League game on 1994, no one has doubted it since.