Lakers fans remember the 2004 NBA Finals.

Or maybe they don’t.

The run-up to the 2008 Finals reminds me a lot of 2004. And that’s not a good thing.

As in 2004 …

There is a widespread assumption the Lakers will win. Without particular difficulty.

Kobe Bryant’s (awesome/unquenchable/unrivaled, take your pick) will to win is cited regularly.

Phil Johnson’s experience in championship situations will be a huge factor in the Lakers’ favor.

We heard all that in 2004. Some of us wrote that, too.

Then the Detroit Pistons went out and choked the life out of the Lakers, winning the series in five games.

Just as in 2004, Lakers fans in 2008 are in for a big letdown.

What surprises me about this go-round is that the Lakers are the pundits’ overwhelming choice to defeat the Boston Celtics — even though the Celtics are remarkably similar to the 2004 Pistons.

They defend like mad. They play a more physical brand of basketball, the kind that referees allow in the postseason and the sort that produces success, more often than not. They have multiple scoring threats. They aren’t dependent on a transcendent performance by any one player. And have a deeper bench.

How it can be that the Lakers are the choice to win this series by seven of the eight espn.com experts … astonishes me. Boston hammered the Lakers in their two regular-season meetings and won 66 games to the Lakers’ 57.

I can conjur only two explanations for why the Lakers suddenly are expected to romp through the Finals — even while Boston has home-court advantage, too.

1. Boston’s struggles in the first two rounds of the playoffs. Both of those series went seven games, with the Celtics unable to win on the other team’s home court. The seven-game stretch against Atlanta was truly puzzling, and the Cleveland series only a bit moreso, considering the Cavaliers are a one-man team.

But those who have been fixating on the Celtics’ issues in rounds 1 and 2 are overlooking what they just did with the Detroit Pistons, arguably the second-best team in the league. Boston took that series 4-2, and won twice on the Pistons’ floor. If the Celtics were in a postseason funk, in late April and early May, it’s over now.

2. Kobe Bryant somehow will overcome all obstacles and simply “will” the Lakers to victory.

Lakers fans have been down this road before. Nobody can will a team to victory, alone. Not Kobe. Not Wilt Chamberlain. Not Michael Jordan. In 2004, there was some of this same sentiment out there — no way Kobe and Shaq lose to a team of five good-but-not-great players.

It happened. Detroit contrived a defense focused on Kobe (especially) and, aside from a huge shot to force overtime in Game 2 (which the Lakers won) … they succeeded in containing him. Kobe averaged a mere-mortal 22.6 points per game while making only 38.1 percent (43 of 113) of his field-goal attempts. He was especially awful (4-for-23, 17.4 percent) from three-point range. The Pistons also did a great job of keeping Kobe out of the lane; he attempted only 25 free throws (five per game, that is) in the series.

And here are some scary Kobe facts: Take out his excellent performance in Game 2 (14-for-27, 33 points), this is what he did in the other four games: 29-for-86 from the field (33.7 percent) and an average of 20.o ppg.

The Pistons decided, in that series, to let Shaquille O’Neal go 1-on-1 with Ben Wallace. Shaq did some damage; he was the series’ leading scorer, at 26.6 ppg, making an eye-popping 63.1 percent of his shots (53-of-84), but he didn’t get the ball often enough, as the Pistons clogged the lane. And the Lakers went down with Kobe hoisting nearly one-third of all the shots his team took in the series (113 of 380).

I see much the same happening this time around. The Lakers will struggle to score. I mean, they start Vlad Radmanovic and a game-but-over-the-hill Derek Fisher. Their No. 3 option is the fade-in/fade-out Lamar Odom. Option No. 2, Pau Gasol, will be neutralized by defensive MVP Kevin Garnett. The Lakers will get few, if any, open looks in the paint. Their offense will degenerate into three-pointers and Kobe freelancing.

By halftime of tonight’s game, Kobe will be taking nearly all the shots, and forcing most of those.

The Celtics win by double digits, and go on to take the series, and (as in 2004) some will be puzzled.

I won’t be one of them. I won’t be happy, but I won’t feel foolish about not anticipating how this is going to go down.