Billy Cunningham sat in the crowd, eager to take in the moment. Julius Erving was also there, seated in a mid-level luxury box. These legends of Philadelphia's basketball past were both in attendance to bear witness to the legend-in-the-making that is Philadelphia's basketball present.

And one day after winning the MVP award -- the shortest player to win the honor, and the first Sixer to win it since 1983 -- Allen Iverson put on a show, scoring 52 points in Philadelphia's blowout win over the Raptors that gave the Sixers a 3-2 advantage in the series.

With each day, Iverson's performances get more and more amazing. A guy who is used to getting to the line, Iverson made only two free throws. Most of his scoring was from long range, with a hand in his face. He hit eight three pointers and made 21 of 32 shots -- the final three misses on three-point attempts, as he was trying to tie the record for three pointers made in a playoff game -- a mark Vince Carter tied last week with nine.

Iverson's now just the second player in NBA history to have two 50-plus games in a playoff series (Michael Jordan's the other guy), and in both of his outings he shot 59.1 percent from the field. Not bad for a guy who has a a less-than-impressive 42.6 field goal percentage for his career.

"People say I have a flaw, and that's not being able to make the outside shot -- and guys will play you a certain way if you don't hit the outside shot," Iverson said. "My thing now is to punish people when they play off me."

Vince Carter might want to take that same philosophy, as he took just 10 shots and scored 16 points. Carter's biggest contribution might have been offering his face for a Dikembe Mutombo backhand slap that left a finger on Mutombo's left hand broken. Mutombo's listed as day to day, although it's hard to imagine his not playing in Friday's possible closeout game.

It's funny, just a couple of days ago Toronto's Charles Oakley was talking about how it was unlikely for Iverson to erupt for another 50-point game. And Raptors guard Chris Childs boasted that Toronto should have swept the Sixers over the first four games.

Credit Iverson for not getting caught up in the war of the words through the media. Iverson's talking his smack to the Raptors on the court. Last night he backed it up with a near Jordan-like effort. Told that Carter, after scoring 50 points last week, said the basket looked like a lake, Iverson had this to say: "Like a lake? To me it looked like an ocean."

And the resulting flood has left the Raptors close to extinction.

Jerry Bembry is covering the NBA playoffs for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at jerry.bembry@espnmag.com.