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Carter wakes up to lead Nets past Cavaliers

Dec 21, 2006 - 6:39 AM EAST RUTHERFORD, New Jersey (Ticker) -- Vince Carter rediscovered his shooting touch.

Carter scored 38 points, including four 3-pointers, and Nenad Krstic added 18 as the New Jersey Nets posted a 113-111 victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers, who wasted 37 points from LeBron James.

Richard Jefferson had 14 points and Jason Kidd, who reached the 13,000-point mark, collected nine points, 10 assists and eight rebounds for the Nets, who have won six of the last eight meetings with the Cavaliers.

Entering the contest averaging just 11.7 points while making just 25 percent (12-of-48) of his shots, Carter turned things around against the Cavs, making 10-of-18 attempts.

"The shooting gods were on my side," Carter said. "I just kept shooting and continued playing. I was able to get to the basket a few times and get a couple of easy ones. I wanted to do whatever I needed to do. I didn't care what it entailed. And I just wanted to be aggressive doing so."

Carter missed just four of his 18 free throws and had six rebounds and five assists.

"When he came out in the first quarter, I told Eddie (House) I thought Vince was going to go for 50 tonight," Kidd said. "We could see him be very aggressive, make all the right plays. When they tried to take the ball out of his hands, he found the open guy."

New Jersey bridged a 13-3 run between the third and fourth quarter to take control of the contest. A jumper by Carter ignited the burst, which was highlighted by an eye-raising one-handed jam by Bostjan Nachbar over Cleveland's Drew Gooden.

A 3-pointer by rookie Marcus Williams capped things for an 86-71 cushion with 11 minutes left.

The Cavs made things interesting down the stretch, finding their stroke from the arc before their road losing streak reached four games. Cleveland hit three 3-pointers in the final 18 seconds, including one by Damon Jones with one tick left.

"The road's a tough place to play," Cavaliers coach Mike Brown said. "We're definitely not the only team in this league that's struggled on the road."

Larry Hughes scored 19 points and Zydrunas Ilgauskas added 18 and 11 rebounds for Cleveland, which allowed New Jersey to shoot 57 percent (39-of-68) overall.