The Celtics play the Lakers tomorrow tonight. Oh, you’ve heard?

With one of the most eagerly anticipated finals in league history getting under way in Boston, it completes a year of dramatic revival for the NBA.

Remember, less than a year ago we were lamenting one of the worst seasons in league history. The Tim Donaghy scandal cut to the core of the league’s credibility. Ratings were in the tank after San Antonio swept Cleveland in a thoroughly uneventful finals. All-Star Weekend in Las Vegas provided the league with another black eye. LeBron James openly admitted to mailing in the first half of the regular season to gear up for the playoffs, and a fiasco over a new ball that seemed to cut up players’ fingers was another misstep.

All that is forgotten now, after a glorious season that saw unprecedented interest in the regular season — thanks in equal parts to an insanely competitive race in the Western Conference and three blockbuster deals at midseason in which All-Stars Pau Gasol, Shaquille O’Neal, and Jason Kidd change teams. The Celtics and Lakers, two of the league’s flagship franchises, rose from the ashes to win their conferences, and even the Knicks have hope after finally kicking Isiah Thomas to the curb.

The only thing left, then, is for these finals to live up to the hype. No problem.

There can be no doubt that Boston and Los Angeles are the league’s two best teams. Boston had the league’s best record at 66-16 and had one of the best point differential marks of all time; since acquiring Gasol, L.A. has been at least as dominant, going 34-7 with him in the lineup despite losing fellow center Andrew Bynum for the season due to a knee injury.

Moreover, it’s a great battle on multiple levels. Blue-collar Boston is the league’s best defensive team — in fact, one of the best of all time — while the Hollywood Lakers have been an elite offensive team since the Gasol trade. Los Angeles sports the league’s MVP in Kobe Bryant, while Boston has the league’s Defensive Player of the Year in Kevin Garnett. For added theater, each star is fighting for his legacy — Bryant as a player who could win a ring without Shaq, Garnett as one who can win a ring period.

So who prevails? We won’t know for two weeks, but ultimately this series will come down to a few important questions. Let’s take a closer look at the four big ones:

Who guards Kobe? Boston’s shooting guard, Ray Allen, is physically overmatched against the bigger, quicker, stronger Bryant, and that could leave the Celtics grasping at alternatives before long. Allen has defended with more zeal this season than at any other point in his career and has added motivation from his long-running feud with Kobe; nonetheless, few expect him to contain Bryant.

The other alternatives are Paul Pierce and James Posey. However, Pierce is Boston’s go-to scorer and the Celtics probably don’t want to risk getting him in foul trouble; additionally, leaving Pierce on Bryant moves Allen into a severe height mismatch against Vladimir Radmanovic. Posey is another option and can be counted on to take at least one questionable foul that makes Bryant think twice about driving to the rim; the question is whether he has the foot speed to stay in front of him.

Unfortunately, Boston’s best option may not be available. Tony Allen is an incredibly active on-ball defender who has the quickness to stay with Bryant (though perhaps not the discipline to stay down on all his ball fakes) and helped hound him into a 6-for-25 night earlier this season. Alas, Allen strained his right Achilles tendon during the conference finals against Detroit and is questionable for the start of the series. He did practice yesterday, however.

The other answer for Boston could simply be to rely on help defense, something they do better than any team in the league. However, Bryant showed in the San Antonio series that he can beat a defender and shoot from 17 feet before the help can get close enough to affect him. If Boston doesn’t have better luck making him work for shots, they’ll have a hard time winning the title.

Who guards Pierce? Pierce is the one truly bad matchup for L.A. Radmanovic is a disinterested defender who will be beaten early and often. Switching Bryant onto him isn’t much of an option either — Radmanovic matches up even worse against Ray Allen.

Instead, Phil Jackson likely will go to his bench early and often. Luke Walton will get the first crack, as he has the physique to battle with Pierce — though not the quickness to handle his quick spins off the drive.

If that fails, Jackson will turn to Sasha Vujacic, a gritty pest who can match up against either Pierce or Allen and leave Bryant to guard the other. My expectation is that Vujacic is the least-bad answer, especially as he’s the best scorer of the three. Don’t be surprised if he plays 25 to 30 minutes a game, making him an important X-factor.

Does Boston play big or small? One question for the Celtics will be how to match up against Gasol. They’ll start with physical beast Kendrick Perkins on him, and one of two things will happen — either Gasol will abuse him with his superior quickness, or Perkins will get under Gasol’s skin.

Certainly Perkins’ breakout effort in the conference finals against Detroit points to the latter as a distinct possibility. But if it’s the former — which has been the case against most other centers Gasol has played — then Boston has to adjust.

In that event, Celtics coach Doc Rivers likely will go long stretches with Garnett sliding over to guard Gasol and James Posey as the power forward in a small-ball lineup. They used this look heavily early in the regular season to great effect, though we saw it less as the year wore on. Matching up against two of the league’s quickest big men in Gasol and Lamar Odom, it might be time for that unit to make a comeback.

Can L.A. win on the road? The answer had better be yes, because the biggest advantage Boston has in this series is that four of the seven games will be in TD Banknorth Garden. Boston is 10-1 at home in the playoffs, and if they win four more in their own building it won’t matter how badly they fare in the three games out West.

Here’s the tricky part for L.A.: Realistically, they probably need to win twice in Boston. The Lakers host the middle three games of the series, but for them to sweep three straight against a team that won a league-best 31 road games in the regular season seems unlikely. If so, that means that Lakers have to take two in Boston to get the ring.

I think they can do it. Between Bryant’s skill and newfound esprit de corps, secondary stars like Gasol and Odom, and a deep and productive bench, it says here that L.A. has a little too much for the Celtics to handle.

Lakers in six.

jhollinger@nysun.com