by David Funk

Created on: February 18, 2007   Last Updated: April 27, 2007

The NBA has not been near as popular over the last decade in part due to the labor dispute in 1998. However, the game has seen a lack of a good rivalry that keeps the league from reaching the levels of the NFL and MLB.

The NFL has rivalries that remind us why we still keep up with the game. The Bears-Packers, Cowboys-Redskins, Eagles-Giants, are rivalries that the American public recognize year in and year out. Same can be said in MLB especially when the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry is brought up as a topic. The Dodgers-Giants and Cubs-Cardinals are still easliy identified with the great game that is baseball as well.

In the NBA, the long-lasting rivalry of the Celtics-Lakers has waned over the years. This rivalry culminated in the 1960's when they clashed six times during the Celtics rise to prominence in the NBA Finals. Stars like Bill Russell, Bob Cousy, Wilt Chamberlain, Jerry West, Elgin Baylor made the rivalry significant despite the fact the Celtics won each of the Finals in route to winning eight straight championships.

The Lakers would end up getting their first championship in Los Angeles after acquiring Kareem Abdul-Jabbar from the Milwaukee Bucks. Meanwhile, the Celtics rebuilt their team around Paul Silas, Dave Cowens, and Jojo White to bring them to the forefront again. So the Lakers would come up short in this rivalry again until they made the one pick that put over the top of the competition - Magic Johnson in 1979.

The Lakers behind Johnson, Abdul-Jabbar, and later James Worthy would make the NBA Finals nine times during Johnson's tenure with the team winning five championships. The Celtics would also draft Larry Bird, Kevin McHale, and acquire Robert Parrish to build quite possibly the best frontcourt in NBA history.

The NBA had struggled to bring in new fans and television revenue was in decline as well throughout the 1970's. But when Magic Johnson and Larry Bird met in the NCAA Championship in 1979, they were forever linked together with their on-court rivalry. The teams combined for eight NBA Titles and at least one of the teams made the Finals in every year in the 1980's. They met in the Finals three times with the Lakers winning two of them. The two teams also played in the second most watched basketball game ever in Game Seven of the 1984 NBA Finals that saw the Celtics take the rubber game.

During the late-1980's, the Detroit Pistons had taken over as the team to beat in the Eastern Conference. They lost to the Lakers in seven games in the 1988

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