NBA FINALS : Bulls Take Pace by Horns : Game 1: Jackson says that fast-breaking Chicago will slow the tempo tonight against Portland.

Welcome to the NBA finals, a best-of-seven proving ground starting tonight at Chicago Stadium and getting stranger by the minute.

The Chicago Bulls, seeking to defend their title and reputation, are talking about having been inconsistent in the playoffs, about having to dig deep for mental toughness.

The Portland Trail Blazers, finalists two years ago, when they lost to Detroit in five games, hope to show they are more than just a band of talented athletes, that they are older and wiser since the last attempt, emphasis on wiser.

The Bulls, led by Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen, say they want to slow the pace.

That these teams play a similar style emphasizing the transition game is unique in itself. The last time that happened in the championship series was the Laker-Boston Celtic showdowns of the early 1980s. In the NBA, that was a generation of talent ago.

But the similarity apparently is too striking for Chicago, which doesn’t plan to try to run with Portland. Maybe it’s in hopes of testing the Trail Blazers’ half-court game, questionable in the past, but the Bulls said Tuesday they will take off only on opportunity breaks and concentrate on keeping the pace slower than normal.

“This is a team that storms the boards very well, plays aggressively in the lane, converts any kind of turnovers, poor shots, errant passes into baskets at the other end of the court,” Bull Coach Phil Jackson said of the Trail Blazers.

“I think they do that better than any team we’ve seen in the recent history in the NBA, perhaps since the Lakers were a run-and-gun team in the early ‘80s. There hasn’t been a team that’s been able to really convert on the fast break like this team can.”

Added Bull guard John Paxson: “I think you’ll see us try, at times, to slow the game down a little bit because they are so athletic. You don’t want to let them put together the big runs on you, where they get a few rebounds, outlets and dunks and all of the sudden they’re up 10.”

Portland Coach Rick Adelman responded with a laugh.

“I think both teams are going to run whenever they can,” he said. “I hope they tell Scottie to walk it up and Jordan to walk it up.”

This has already been a trying playoff run for the Bulls. After winning 67 games during the regular season, among them both against Portland, they swept Miami during the first round of the playoffs, then expected to do the same against the New York Knicks, 51-game winners.

Problem was, the Knicks played like the Pistons and the series stretched to seven games. Pippen, who averaged 21 points and shot 50.6% during the regular season, was at 16 and 40.2% against New York.

The Bulls, of course, survived. The reward was a six-game series against Cleveland in the Eastern Conference finals, during which more holes were punched in the idea that Chicago was invincible.

“It’s a challenging situation to try and repeat, we know that,” said Jordan, averaging 34 points during the playoffs.

“The flavor of it all is we really haven’t played the consistent Chicago Bulls’ basketball that we did last year to win. This is a great time to show that. . . .

“It’s all mental. We’ve got 11 of the 12 players from last year, so it’s a mental toughness that we have to endure this season in repeating. And that’s probably the most difficult part about it.”

It should feel a little like last season to Jordan, then and now half of the matchup under a microscope. It was a little misleading in ’91 because he and Magic Johnson rarely went head to head, not that any of that mattered in the publicity. But Portland vs. Chicago will provide an actual confrontation, Jordan against Clyde Drexler.

“At that level, it doesn’t get any better,” Drexler said.

Shooting guards in the bodies of small forwards, Drexler at 6 feet 7 and Jordan at 6-6 are most comfortable playing above the rim. Jordan was voted the league’s MVP, Drexler the runner-up. Jordan was No. 1 in scoring during the regular season, Drexler No. 4.

The Bulls have reinforcements in Pippen, who showed his versatility in the finals last season with his bump-and-run defense against Johnson, a point guard who would also post up. He figures to get the call often on Drexler, too.

Pippen, though, will have his own potential menace to contend with, Jerome Kersey. One of the game’s best rebounding small forwards, Kersey can force Pippen to stay close to the lane after shots instead of being able to release early for breaks. And Kersey is averaging 16.8 points and 52.3% shooting in the playoffs.