2001 NBA All-Star Game

Result

MVP: Allen Iverson

Box score

Bench (10+ points): Ray Allen (15), Stephon Marbury (12)

Bench (10+ points): Michael Finley (12)

Game context

The 50th NBA All-Star Game, played February 11, 2001, produced one of the format's most memorable comebacks. The West, powered by size and interior scoring, controlled the game for nearly 40 minutes and built a 21-point lead, 95-74, with roughly nine minutes left. Kobe Bryant led the West with 19 points and appeared to have the game in hand, but the East's guards turned the final stretch into a track meet. Allen Iverson, the game's eventual MVP, scored 15 of his game-high 25 points in that final nine-minute stretch, repeatedly slashing into the lane and getting to the free-throw line as the East chipped away possession by possession. Stephon Marbury supplied the connective tissue down the stretch, hitting two three-pointers in the final 53 seconds — the second, with 28 seconds remaining, proved to be the decisive shot of the game. The West had one last chance: with the East up by a point, Bryant hesitated on a drive before finally kicking the ball out to an open Tim Duncan, whose last-second attempt missed, sealing the East's stunning 111-110 win and completing a 21-point deficit erased almost entirely in the fourth quarter's final minutes. The game was played in Washington, D.C., marking the city's third time hosting the event since 1969, at the MCI Center (now Capital One Arena), and it doubled as a milestone anniversary for the exhibition itself — the 50th edition since the format's 1951 debut. Iverson's MVP award was emblematic of his ascendant stardom: the Philadelphia 76ers guard was in the midst of an MVP-caliber regular season that would culminate, a few months later, in him leading the 76ers to the 2001 NBA Finals against the Lakers, making this All-Star performance a preview of the do-it-all, high-usage brilliance that defined his league MVP campaign. The comeback also fit a broader pattern that had begun to define the modern All-Star Game: increasingly, these contests were decided less by sustained execution than by which team's stars decided to turn up the defensive and competitive intensity in the closing minutes, with the preceding three-plus quarters played at a far more relaxed, exhibition pace. The 2001 game's whiplash swing — a 21-point blowout transformed into a one-point classic in the space of nine minutes — became one of the most-cited examples of that dynamic for years afterward, frequently invoked in later debates (which would eventually produce the Elam Ending and other format changes) about how to engineer competitive fourth quarters throughout the game rather than relying on stars to simply decide to play defense once the score got embarrassing.

Sources

• Basketball-Reference — NBA All-Star Game History
• Basketball-Reference — NBA & ABA All-Star Game MVP (Kobe Bryant Trophy)