This year?s road to the NBA Finals was a bumpy one. Heading into the postseason a month and-a-half ago, many people thought the NBA Champion would be determined by a Western Conference Finals series between the Dallas Mavericks and the Phoenix Suns. Within ten days all hopes of such a series were dashed by the run-and-gun Golden State Warriors, and the tide of the 2007 NBA Playoffs was forever changed.

After yet another week or so, and a controversial call by the League office, the Suns were eliminated by the San Antonio Spurs and the road to the title seemed more wide open than ever before. With the Spurs and the Detroit Pistons both in their respective conference finals it was forecast that we?d experience what some called ?another boring NBA Finals.?

Heading into those Conference Finals, I felt as though the NBA critics were right. There was no way that Utah Jazz were going to get passed the battle-tested Spurs, and the play of Tim Duncan ultimately proved me, and the majority of the media, right. In my mind the Cleveland-Detroit match-up would be an entirely different beast. Although extremely young, the Cavs made a nice postseason run last year and very nearly knocked the Pistons out in the second round.

Up until the series between the Pistons and Cavs I felt, along with most of the country, that the first round series between the Mavericks and Warriors was the most entertaining of the postseason (the Phoenix/San Antonio series was fun to watch as well, but the conclusion left me with too much of a bitter taste). Forty-eight hours after the Eastern Conference Finals began, even with the Pistons up 2-0, you could almost feel that the series was on its way to becoming a historic one.

Each of the first five games went down to the wire, including a thrilling double-overtime classic that gave the Cavs a 3-2 series lead. LBJ cemented his place in NBA playoff lore scoring twenty nine of Cleveland?s final thirty points in Detroit, and putting the Pistons? backs against the wall. There weren?t any glaring differences between the 2007 Cavs and the 2006 version of the team that let a 3-2 lead over Detroit slip away, except for a little second round draft pick out of Texas named Daniel Gibson.

After averaging less than five points per game for Cleveland during the regular season Gibson lit up the Pistons for thirty-one in Game Six, and an average of 13.5 over the entire series. He also hit an unbelievable twelve three pointers against Detroit, including a 5-for-5 performance on Saturday night. With many wondering whether Larry Hughes or Drew Gooden could help LBJ leapfrog Detroit, Gibson calmly knocked down big shot after big shot en route to a national ?breaking-out? party.

If the League was worried about ratings for the Finals, they got their wish in a player like James. The Cavaliers might not be a huge market team, and for that matter neither are the Spurs or where the Pistons or Jazz, but LeBron is the biggest star of them all. With LeBron holding more endorsements than you can shake a stick at, he might be the most marketable player to play in the Finals since Michael Jordan (sorry, D-Wade).

As for the Western Conference Champion Spurs, they?ll enter the series favored, by some heavily. They had a relatively easy time with the Jazz, and it cannot be discounted that the Cavaliers played a rather intense series with the physically demanding Pistons heading into Thursday?s Game One. San Antonio knows exactly what they are going to get from a majority of their roster. Duncan will consistently put up a double-double and try to work his way around Cleveland?s big men. Tony Parker will try his best to make Gibson and Hughes work on defense, which will in turn reduce their offense, and Manu Ginobili will fire shots from all angles of the court (and make most of them).

I don?t feel that Bruce Bowen will be able to lace down LBJ, but Duncan and Parker should have their way with the Cavaliers defense (even though it?s a tough one). If the Cavaliers hoist the NBA Title after the dust settles, James will have had everything to do with it. His supporting cast was good enough to skate past the Wizards and Nets, and played to their potential against the Pistons, but they?ll all need to play like Gibson in order to push LBJ past the most consistent team the NBA has seen in recent years.

Too much has been made of that fact that Cleveland had regular season success against San Antonio, as the Spurs are an entirely different beast in the playoffs. At the very least, while the Cavs have Geraldo ? the Spurs have Eva Longoria.

What do you think of this year?s NBA Finals match-up? Let Andrew know so he can sleep well at night:   [email protected]