The NBA released its 75th Anniversary Team Oct. 21, featuring two former Georgetown University basketball team members, Patrick Ewing (CAS ’85) and Allen Iverson. Ewing and Iverson are two of the most dominant stars in Georgetown athletics history. 

The NBA 75th Anniversary Team, chosen by a panel of current and former NBA players, coaches and members of the media, honors the best 75 players in NBA history in honor of the league’s 75th season. The list ended up including 76 players, after a tie in voting.

Ewing, now head coach of the Georgetown men’s basketball team, arrived on the Hilltop in 1981 as the most heralded recruit in the nation. He was so highly regarded that 150 members of the media came to watch him commit to Georgetown at a Boston restaurant. 

Ewing had a remarkable four years with Head Coach John Thompson Jr. and the Hoyas. A formidable seven-foot center, he was a consensus First-Team All American in 1983, 1984 and 1985. He led Georgetown to three appearances in the national championship game and a national title in 1984, where he was named Most Outstanding Player. Throughout his college career, Ewing endured racist taunts from opposing fans, including one instance when fans threw banana peels onto the court. 

Ewing’s play launched Georgetown men’s basketball into the national spotlight, establishing the program as a perennial contender in both the Big East and the NCAA as a whole. He left the Hilltop with the second-most points and most total rebounds, blocks and games played in Georgetown men’s basketball history. 

After graduating from Georgetown in 1985, Ewing was selected first overall in the NBA Draft by the New York Knicks. He was named Rookie of the Year in his first season, averaging 20 points and nine rebounds per game. Ewing spent 15 years with the Knicks, finishing with career averages of 21 points, 9.8 rebounds and 2.5 blocks per game and earning 11 selections to the NBA All-Star team. Today, Ewing is the Knicks’ all-time leader in points, rebounds, blocked shots, steals and field goals made, and he was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame in 2008. Ewing was also named to the NBA’s 50th Anniversary Team in 1996.

Allen Iverson also left his mark on the Hilltop a decade after Ewing departed. Highly recruited as a high schooler, his college prospects were ripped away in 1993 when he was sentenced to 15 years in prison for his role in a bowling alley brawl in Hampton, Va. Some argued the case was racially charged, but Iverson still served four months in jail before a judge lifted his conviction, citing a lack of evidence. College programs were hesitant to offer Iverson a scholarship and Coach Thompson was the only coach willing to take a chance on him. 

Thompson’s decision paid off, and Iverson quickly rose to stardom. In his two years at Georgetown, he averaged 22.9 points per game, was named the Big East Defensive Player of the Year in both years, set the Big East single-season record for steals, earned All-American honors and led the Hoyas to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA tournament. 

Iverson declared for the 1996 NBA draft and was selected first overall by the Philadelphia 76ers, beginning an illustrious professional career. Over the course of his 14 seasons in the NBA, Iverson was selected to 11 NBA All-Star teams, led the NBA in scoring four times and won the 2001 NBA Most Valuable Player award. Iverson retired with a career average of 26.7 points per game, the seventh-highest in NBA history.

While Ewing, the imposing seven-foot center, and Iverson, the speedy six-foot guard, had dramatically different styles, the two Hoyas share a surprisingly long list of similarities. Both had hugely successful careers at Georgetown under Coach Thompson, tackled racial adversity, were drafted first overall into the NBA, were named NBA Rookie of the Year and were selected to eleven NBA All-Star teams. Now, both are members of the NBA 75th Anniversary Team, cementing their legacies as two of the greatest basketball players of all time.