TORONTO - Vince Carter has been asked numerous times over the last few days if playing in front of Raptors fans has any effect on his game.
Carter has been quick to douse such an idea, either with a simple "no," or a sigh of frustration and a wave of the hand.
But after two first-round playoff games, the theory that an arena full of hostile Raptors fans could stop Carter better than any defense doesn't seem so farfetched.
Carter hit just eight of 24shots in the Nets' 89-83 loss to the Raptors last night in front of 20,239 delirious Canadians, who booed and taunted Carter from the start.
The Nets didn't take advantage of the opportunity to sweep two games in Toronto, and the series resumes at the Meadowlands Friday tied at a game apiece.
Carter's 19-point performance was barely better than the one he turned in Saturday, when he hit just five of 19 shots for 16 points.
Afterward, the media ran a backdoor play, asking Carter's teammates if anything about playing in Canada, where he starred for 6-1/2 seasons, throws him off his game.
"I don't know," said Bostjan Nachbar. "That's a question for him, if that really bothers him."
Moments later, Carter was asked if he was looking forward to getting out of the building, at least until the series returns to Toronto for Game 5 on May 1.
"Whatever," he said.
Though Carter made just four of his 11 shots in the first half, the cold-shooting Nets went into the break up 36-33, mostly because the Raptors were worse. Toronto made only 12 of 39 shots (30%) in the opening half.
Unlike in Game 1, when Carter had plenty of help, the rest of the Nets were just as ineffective. Richard Jefferson didn't score in the first half.
"The whole game offensively we just seemed like we weren't able to make shots," Nets coach Lawrence Frank said. "You've got to give Toronto a lot of credit. They played extremely hard. There's a reason why we missed shots. They affected them."
Said Jason Kidd: "We felt very confident coming down the stretch that we could win this game, but unfortunately we didn't. We're not disappointed. We came up here to win Game 2 and we gave our best effort."
Jefferson heated up, giving the Nets a 40-37lead by scoring their first four points of the third quarter, which ended with the Nets leading 63-58.
The Raptors started the fourth quarter on a 10-0 run, getting eight points during that stretch from Anthony Parker, who led Toronto with 26 points. Chris Bosh, who scored 25 points, turned a wild four-foot shot into a three-point play during the spurt.
The Nets regained the lead, 73-72, when Nachbar hit a three-pointer with 5:16 left in the game. They were up, 78-74, after Kidd's three-pointer from straight away with 3:42 to play.
With 46 seconds left, Jefferson drilled a three-pointer that put the Nets up 83-82. After Toronto went up by one on a pair of T.J. Ford free throws, Jefferson missed a 17-footer with 20 seconds left.
Following two more free throws from Ford that put the Nets in a three-point hole, Nachbar was long on a wide-open three-point shot from the corner. Parker hit three free throws in the final eight seconds to ice it.
Through it all, Carter - who averaged 29 points in nine-regular season games in April, winning player of the month honors - kept shooting. He promised to do the same the rest of the series, regardless of where the games are played.
"I'm not making shots but I'm still aggressive, still confident," he said. "I'm still going to play my same game until the end. I'm not worried about the shots going in. If I remain aggressive I'll play my way out of it."
But the Raptors also vowed to be aggressive as they gained confidence in evening the series.
"We definitely turned a corner as a team tonight because we gutted it out, especially when things weren't going well," Parker said. "This was a game we had to have. We couldn't go to Jersey down 0-2. Now we've got to go to Jersey and get one."