“Practice, man. We talkin’ bout’ practice.” And practice was exactly what everyone was talking about this week when Team USA officially began its quest for the 2004 Olympic Gold Medal. Fresh off his first NBA championship, Detroit Pistons head coach Larry Brown was there to run the show. And so was perhaps his most appreciative player ever, Allen Iverson. Brown and Iverson have a basketball history that dates back to 1997 when Brown was hired to transform a miserable Philadelphia 76ers team that went 22-60 the previous season. The young star Brown was asked to mold? None other than a 21 year-old rookie named Iverson.

Allen Iverson

My, how times have changed. Three scoring titles, one MVP award, one NBA Finals appearance and hundreds of trade rumors later, Iverson is still a Sixer, and at 29 years of age is the oldest player on Team USA. You have got to be kidding me. I never thought I’d hear the words saying Allen Iverson was the oldest player on any basketball team. But that time has come, and Iverson, along with Tim Duncan, is a co-captain to boot.

To say Iverson has come a long way from that incredible rookie year of 1996-97 to his now second stint with Team USA would be like saying that the Beastie Boys changed hip-hop. Words alone just don’t do this journey justice. Over the past eight years, through his life on and off the court, Iverson has grown as a person, a player and a teammate. There are no more controversial rap albums, no more felony arrests and not nearly as many negative press clippings about this small wonder. What we see now is a maturing man who has grown up in the world of professional basketball, as so many of today’s young players now do. For the past decade and a half, all Iverson has seen about the game of basketball are the glitz, glamour and riches that come with the NBA lifestyle. He is finally to the point where all that stuff can be cast aside and he can focus on the important aspects of the game: playing a team game, and playing to win.

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New Philadelphia head coach Jim O’Brien has been harshly criticized this off-season after stating that his team concept will be more successful with Iverson playing point guard rather than the shooting guard he has been accustomed to for the past five-plus seasons. While O’Brien intends to make due on his promise of moving Iverson to the point, you will not see the same point guard you saw in his first two years in the league. Iverson was still a kid then, learning the position, when he had Jerry Stackhouse taking shots that he wanted to take. He was a shooting guard playing point guard.

This season, however, Iverson will be a point guard playing point guard. He has come to that time in a player’s career where he now sees the game with more of a team outlook. Look for #3 to get young teammates like Willie Green, John Salmons, Samuel Dalembert and Andre Iguodala heavily involved in the offense by penetrating and dishing for some open looks. Don’t count out the occasional 40 or 50 point game by The Answer, however. The guy is still at the top of his game, and he understands that on some nights he will have to take over and revert to his old shooting guard self in order to win some games.

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Before the 76ers embark on their quest back to the upper echelon of the Eastern Conference, there are a few games in Athens that Iverson would like to win. Being viewed as a leader will be nothing new to Iverson, but being viewed as a leader on this good of a team will be. With four players on Team USA aged 21 or younger, Iverson will be looked to for his ability to teach as much as his ability to play. And I have a feeling Iverson can do a little teaching, being a pupil of one of the greatest basketball teachers ever in Brown. So let the rest of the world be warned: you are about to witness 6 feet, 165 pounds of a lightning rod coming at you on the basketball court. And the only pieces of heavy artillery Allen Iverson will have with him in Athens are the benefit of experience and the will to win.