Kidd gets another triple-double and leads Nets over Cavs

After losing the first two games of the series against the Cleveland Cavaliers, the New Jersey Nets were in need of a strong show at home and they delivered. The Nets improved to 4-0 in the playoffs(and 10-0 going back to the regular season) at home after beating the Cavs, 96-85. The big three-Jason Kidd, Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson- all contributed in big ways, Kidd, Jefferson and Carter all had 23 points in the game. Kidd, along with his 23 points added 14 assists and 13 rebounds, Jefferson tallied 8 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 steals to his 23 points and Vince Carter, despite missing sometime after having to go to the locker to tape a sprained finger, grabbed 6 rebounds and 4 assists with his 23 point effort.

"He was terrific. His intensity, his ability to attack the paint, his will and doing it on both ends playing at such a high energy level," Nets coach Lawrence Frank said. "The triple-double, that is obviously such a tangible thing. He was tremendous on both ends. As a captain he set a great tone playing throughout their runs. He was obviously very, very special."

New Jersey was able to cool off the hot shooting LeBron James, James scored only 18 points, which snapped his 20-game streak of scoring at least 20 points in the playoffs. James did add 12 assists and 6 rebounds. The Cavs also had two players foul out, Sasha Pavolvic, who had been playing great defense on Carter in both games one and two and then Zydrunas Ilgauskas fouled out as well.

Most importantly for New Jersey, the Nets controlled the backboards after the Cavs pummeled them in the first two games, piling up a 100-69 rebounding advantage, including 39-12 on the offensive end.

"I have to give credit to our bigs," Jefferson said. "They did a great job of keeping them off the glass. In the first two games, there were some things we were doing defensively that I think were putting us in a bad way on the offensive glass and we adjusted to that."

The next game is going to be on Monday at 7:00 pm ET.