Finally!

The title defense begins tonight in Boston against the Cavs. It's a national TV game -- 8 p.m. on TNT. It's the first of 25 national TV dates for us, and we've got another seven on NBATV. Almost makes buying NBA League Pass not worth it.

Almost.

About the Cavs: They're obviously on the short list of championship contenders from the Eastern Conference. We split four regular-season matchups with them last year, winning 80-70 and 92-87 at home, and losing 109-104 and 114-113 in Cleveland. And, of course, they took us to seven games in the Eastern Conference semis.

One of our regular-season wins came when they were without LeBron due to injury; one of theirs came when we were without KG due to injury. Of the two regular-season games the two teams played at full-strength last year, one was played before the Cavs sent Drew Gooden to the Bulls, one after.

It seems weird to take a team that has LeBron James and say that Drew Gooden was the key difference between the two games, but the stats don't lie. Gooden got 24 against us in that 109-104 game at the end of November. After that, we beat them when they didn't have LeBron, nearly beat them when we didn't have KG, and beat them at full strength (after Gooden was shipped).

My theory is that Boston's defense is so dependent on Garnett's help D that a scoring power forward is a key to beating the Celtics. KG can surely guard Gooden one-on-one, but if he plays "honest," the Cs aren't going to be as good on defense (and, of course, it's hard to play straight up when the other team has LeBron James). Gooden killed us in that first game, hitting shots when KG wandered, thereby forcing Garnett to play more honest than usual. When Gooden was replaced in the starting lineup with Ben Wallace after the trade, Garnett could go back to his outstanding help defense without repercussion.

Cleveland hasn't solved that problem yet (although based on what I saw in the Vegas Summer League, rookie J.J. Hickson could be the answer sooner rather than later), but they did add an important piece in former Milwaukee point guard Mo Williams. LeBron has basically run the show throughout his entire career in Cleveland, and while Mo is something more of a scorer than an assist guy, he's easily the best playermaker James has ever called a teammate in the NBA. It will be interesting to see how LeBron adjusts to playing off the ball a bit more, and how Mo regulates his own shot totals in the presence of a true superstar.

I think it's going to take a little time for that chemistry to work itself out, and the TD Banknorth Garden will be rocking on opening night. It's always a risk to pick against LeBron, and I'm not going to get into the habit of picking games, but I see a relatively comfortable Boston victory. I expect the margin to be double digits, but that won't be a true representation of how good Cleveland is and how close the teams really are.