Seattle ? The Seattle SuperSonics are glad they only have to see Allen Iverson twice a season.
Iverson scored 34 points, including 13 in the fourth quarter, and the Philadelphia 76ers won their third straight game by defeating the SuperSonics 114-107 Friday night.
Iverson, the NBA’s leading scorer, shot 13-for-30 and had seven assists.
“He’s good,” said Luke Ridnour, Seattle’s second-year starting point guard. “He’s an All-Star guard and he’s attacking all the time. He shot 30 times, so it’s tough to guard someone like that when they’re having the ball that much. He’s pretty fast.”
Ray Allen had 32 points, including 19 in the final period for the Northwest Division-leading Sonics (20-6).
The 76ers beat a Western Conference team for the third straight time after starting the season 0-8 against opponents from the West. They’ve won seven of their last nine overall.
Philadelphia never relinquished its lead in the second half.
Allen cut the Sonics’ deficit to 87-81 with a layup in the first 20 seconds of the fourth quarter, but Kyle Korver hit a 3-pointer, Corliss Williamson converted a three-point play and Iverson responded with a 3-pointer to put the 76ers in front 96-81 with 2:14 gone in the final period. The Sonics never threatened after that.
Of course, the 76ers love what Iverson does for them, too.
“I think he is the guy who feels the responsibility of stepping up in the second half,” coach Jim O’Brien said of his nine-year star veteran. “He’s our leader and he knows that we are going to call his number enough times that we are going to allow him to get hot.”
“It’s just about playing for 48 minutes and to get it done,” Iverson said. “It’s a good feeling.”
Willie Green scored a season-high 20 points, Kenny Thomas added 15 and Marc Jackson and Williamson each had 13 for Philadelphia, which lost to Seattle at home in November.
“We’ve got confidence in him every night,” Korver said of Iverson. “When he gets on a roll like he did tonight and like he has the last two weeks, it makes us all a lot better.”
For the Sonics, Ridnour had 16 points and nine assists, while Reggie Evans had a season-high 14 points.
“We didn’t knock shots down the way we wanted to tonight,” Seattle’s Antonio Daniels said. “But defensively you don’t want to give up that many points in a game because it’s very difficult to win when you give up 110 points, 120 points in a game.”
The Sonics cut their deficit to three points three times in the third quarter, the last time at 76-73 with 3:49 to go on two free throws by Allen. The 76ers outscored Seattle 11-6 after that with Iverson making a layup in the final minute.
Thomas had 13 points in the first quarter and Iverson 10 in the second, helping the 76ers to a 59-48 lead at halftime. Philadelphia’s biggest lead in the opening half was 15 points at 59-44 after Iverson’s reverse layup on a fast break with 1:20 left.
The Sonics lost on a night when their 3-point shooting was off. They were 8-for-33, with Vladimir Radmanovic going 1-for-7.
Radmanovic said the 76ers had a lot to do with his team’s poor outside shooting.
“They were pretty aggressive on our pick and rolls,” he said. “They took us out of a lot of things we wanted to run.”
Notes: The Sonics got back PG Daniels back after he missed two games because of acute tonsillitis. Daniels played 20 minutes and scored six points on 1-for-4 shooting. … The 76ers beat the Sonics for the fourth straight time in Seattle. Seattle’s last victory over Philadelphia at home came March 19, 2001. … The 76ers have won games on consecutive days for the first time this season.
