Boston guard Ray Allen scored a pair of tickets to Tuesday's presidential inauguration in Washington D.C. and is honored to bring the memories back to his teammates.
"So much coverage has taken place over the last couple of days about the inauguration ... and I'm sure the people of D.C. are seeing D.C. like they never have before," Allen said on Monday night. "I don't remember this much coverage of another inauguration, and this much anticipation for obvious reasons."
Allen landed a pair of tickets from Illinois Congressman Tim Johnson.
"To be able to be there to document it, to take pictures, and to be able to talk about it, you know, it's one thing to see it on television, but to be there on the ground while everything is happening ... I'm glad that at least one of us will be in the presence for this event, so at least I can bring it back to the guys on the team, show them pictures and talk about everything that is going on so at least they can have that since they aren't going to be there," Allen commented. "And not just my teammates, but people in this organization, and friends and family. I've learned over the last day or so, so many of my friends are just driving down there to be in the vicinity. I think they are expecting four million in D.C., but it might be even more than that."
Allen admitted that this year's election was a hot topic in NBA locker rooms because of the struggling economy of the United States.
"We had a lot of debate on it, and what has been going on. We have an impact, and what this presidential election meant to all of us. I think if you go back when Bush was re-elected it didn't affect a lot of us the same. Guys have more money and we have more to lose and there's a lot more responsibly in guy's lives. So now, this election and definitely the state of the economy has affected a lot of people in this locker room more so than in the past. We have to be responsible."