SAN FRANCISCO -- LeBron James called the Golden State Warriors the "best" team in the NBA not once, but twice Friday night.

How's that for stoking the flames of what's supposed to be the league's best rivalry?

"We don't look at it as a rival," James said. "They're a great team. They've been the best team the last couple years, last three years."

James' words on the subject range somewhere from debatable to nonsensical.

The Cavs and Warriors are rivals. The splitting of the past two Finals. The smack talk. The finger pointing. The obsession that haunted the Cavs for much of last season, and the rage that drove them when they were down 3-1 and felt disrespected. The Halloween Party (much more on that in a minute).

And while it's true the Warriors own the NBA's best record over the past 21/2 seasons, it was the Cavs who beat them when it mattered most, in June. And of course Cleveland won again on Christmas, coming back from 14 points down to win 109-108 on Kyrie Irving's late jumper.

So when the two franchises meet again at 8:30 p.m. Monday at Oracle Arena, it will be the NBA-leading Warriors (34-6) against the East-leading Cavs (29-10) in the latest iteration of a rivalry. James might be only one saying it isn't (Tyronn Lue, as he's done several times, said again Friday it was).

But when it comes to the best team, it's the Cavs who've won the last four games in this series, starting with Game 5 of the Finals. So count this as James applying his own form of gamesmanship to Monday's festivities.

"It's just the next game, it's Golden State," James said. "They're a helluva team, like I said the best team in the league and they've been that way the last three years, four years, however long it's been, I'm not quite sure. But, listen, you guys know, we don't put all our eggs in one basket for one game."

James scored 31 on Christmas to Kevin Durant's 36, who experienced the Cavs-Warriors rivalry for the first time. Irving scored 25. Klay Thompson had 24. It was 20 for Kevin Love and 15 for Stephen Curry.

Both teams know not to make much out of a regular-season game against the other. At one time, the Warriors had defeated Cleveland seven times in a row, ranging from the 2015 Finals, to both games last season, through games 1 and 2 of the 2016 Finals. And in the end that momentum didn't get them far enough (included in there was a 34-point drubbing by Golden State at The Q, on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, in fact).

But the Warriors seem to be putting a fair amount of emphasis on this one. In a wide-ranging interview with USA Today, Thompson said his team wanted to "win so bad ... because we still have a bad taste in our mouth" from blowing a 3-1 lead in the Finals.

Oh, and Thompson didn't like James' Halloween Party.

Around the time of the party, pictures instantly hit social media showing a skeleton behind a drum, on which was inscribed "3-1 lead." There were tombstone cookies for Thompson and Curry.

Then, following the Christmas Day game, ESPN reported that guests at James' party had to step over a Curry doll.

"It's obviously not respectful, so it's got to be on the other side of the spectrum, so that's fine with us," Thompson told USA Today. "They can do that childish stuff. It doesn't matter to us. All we've got to do is handle it on the court, you know?

"I still think we need to play with more of an edge next time we see them." Thompson continued. "I mean when we won the championship, though, we didn't do some stuff like that. But that's OK. People are built differently. We're not going to - I'm not going to hold it against them. I'm just going to go out there, and we just want to beat them down next time we see them. That's how it is. Hold that in the memory bank, and just remember that they do that stuff...It's a good rivalry, and it's good for the NBA."

Thompson, of course, is the one who, before Game 5, told James on the podium that the NBA was a "man's league." And there was Curry wondering aloud if the visitor's locker room at The Q still smelled like champagne from the '15 Finals.

Irving was given the chance to make the same crack Friday night, after the Cavs dumped the Sacramento Kings 120-108. He was asked if the memories of Game 7 would come rushing back when he walks into Oracle, and he said: "I wouldn't go that deep as memories flashing, but it's just an exciting thing, man.

"We'd be lying if we didn't say that it wasn't a great competitive game that we're looking forward to. Who doesn't want to see that?"

No one, Kyrie. No one.