Amare's minicamp could begin Thursday

Carmelo Anthony welcomed the news of an agreement in principle to end the NBA lockout with a one-word tweet.

"Showtime!!!!!!!''

Yes, the show will go on for Melo and the Knicks, who expect to open the 66-game NBA regular season at noon Christmas Day against the Boston Celtics, an NBA source said. That game, to be televised by ESPN, was on the original 82-game schedule, and the source said it is expected to remain as is.

The rest of the schedule is being created and tickets will not be available until the new schedule is released, the source said. That won't come until after a new collective-bargaining agreement is officially completed, which might not be for several days.

Training camps are scheduled to open Dec. 9 and players will not be permitted to use team facilities, such as the MSG Training Center, until the lockout is officially lifted.

In the meantime, Amar'e Stoudemire has gotten to work on organizing a minicamp for his teammates to get together beforehand -- likely at the IMG Basketball Academy in Florida -- to get a jump-start on what will be a very short preseason. This minicamp could start as early as Thursday.

The short training camp means coach Mike D'Antoni, who is in the final year of his contract, won't get much time to work with what still is a relatively new group of players. D'Antoni's tenure with the Knicks has involved major roster turnover in each of his first four seasons, including last season, when Anthony and Chauncey Billups arrived in a 15-player deal in late February.

D'Antoni could not comment because the lockout had not yet been officially lifted.

Aside from the additions of first-round pick Iman Shumpert and second-rounder Josh Harrellson, the roster won't see many new names from last season's playoff team.

Free agents Roger Mason Jr. and Jared Jeffries are expected to be offered one-year veteran's-minimum contracts, but the Knicks won't go beyond one-year deals in order to preserve salary-cap space for a more important free-agency period that awaits in 2012, when All-Star guards Chris Paul and Deron Williams and All-Star center Dwight Howard will be available.

It is unknown whether center Jerome Jordan, a second-round pick from 2010, will be invited to camp. Jordan, a raw 7-footer, has an out clause with his European team, but the Knicks are going to be extremely mindful of their payroll under the rules of the new CBA.

With the salary cap expected to be at $58.8 million, the Knicks, at $60 million, are already over and are within $10 million of the luxury-tax threshold. The new agreement is expected to include a provision that penalizes teams for being over the tax threshold four times in a span of five seasons. With money to spend in 2012, and the ambition to build a championship roster, the Knicks will want to preserve their tax years for the future.

And in the wake of Donnie Walsh's departure, who will be the point man in these decisions? That remains to be seen, though it appears for now that the franchise will be led by the experienced committee of Glen Grunwald, John Gabriel and Mark Warkentien and executive-in-training Allan Houston.

The Dolan family owns controlling interests in the Knicks, MSG and Cablevision. Cablevision owns Newsday.