He maneuvered his way through the First Union Center corridors in typical Allen Iverson fashion: white 'do-rag covering his signature cornrows, stylish sunglasses with a slight purple tint, baggy jeans and a long platinum chain around his neck. Maybe his image off the court is in contrast to what the NBA would like to project. But what he did on the court Wednesday night in Game 2 of the Eastern Conference semifinals? It's the reason why the NBA will soon name A.I. the league's MVP.

In what may be one of the best little-man performances in NBA history, Iverson scored 54 points -- and the Sixers needed every single one of them -- in a 97-92 win over the Raptors that evened the series. While it's doubtful the Sixers can win this series with one player hitting 21 of 39 shots and the rest of the team hitting 13 of 40, Iverson served notice that if he goes down he'll do so firing away. "I expect to have a game like this every night," Iverson said. "I always feel like the only player that can stop me is me."

There are few people who could have stopped Allen's fourth-quarter run, when he scored 19 straight points on an assortment of shots, ranging from step-back three-pointers to drives in the lane where -- with contact -- he still got baskets that carried high degrees of difficulty. He didn't get a breather until he was taken out with 14 seconds left, soaking up the roar of the crowd. "Phenomenal," is how Larry Brown described the effort. "And he didn't even yell at me once."

Typically, comparisons to Michael Jordan come with players who favor the game's greatest player physically (Penny, Vince, Stack). Yet despite standing less than 6 feet tall, Iverson is the only player currently in the league who can dominate in a Jordan-like way. He plays with incredible intensity, and does it on both ends of the court. After scoring his final points he squeezed between the trees to grab a key defensive rebound, and a short time later he got a big deflection that led to a steal -- as Brown says, his defense "has improved 8,000 percent."

That said, the Sixers are in trouble. Iverson can't carry the load of this series alone. And the Raptors, after stealing Game 1, show no signs of relaxing. They were very much in Game 2 in the final minute, despite Iverson's onslaught.

What will the Raptors do? They'll probably double Iverson more in Game 3, putting the Sixers' fate in the hands of other players. And they'll probably get a bit more physical, meaning you'll see Iverson on his ass Sunday more than usual.

You'd think Iverson would have been giddy about his impressive performance. But his matter-of-fact, shrug-of-the-shoulders response to his game showed a focus on the bigger picture. "People always come up to me and ask, 'you gonna score 40, you gonna score 50?' " he said. "That don't matter to me. All I want to do is win."

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