Anyone else having flashbacks to the last time the Nets won the first game of a series on the road? A year ago in Miami, New Jersey won the opener handily against the eventual world champions. Unfortunately, Richard Jefferson hurt his ankle just as the Heat awoke from their slumber, and the result was four straight defeats and a beeline for the golf course.

Now it appears history might be repeating itself. The Nets won Saturday’s series opener on the road and nearly made it 2–0 on Tuesday before succumbing 89–83, but a key injury has again interjected itself into the series.

It turns out Jason Kidd’s left knee is somewhere south of 100% after banging it while taking a charge in Tuesday’s 89–83 Game 2 loss in Toronto, causing him to miss practice yesterday. He’ll be a game-time decision for tonight’s Game 3 at Continental Airlines Arena (7 p.m., YES/ESPN2), and Nets fans will be crossing their fingers that the decision is to give it a go.

Most likely it will be, but there remain consequences to consider. Let’s start with the worst-case scenario that Kidd sits out. Losing him at any time is a huge blow for the Nets; Vince Carter may be the go-to guy, but Kidd is still the emotional core of the team and the offensive tempo-setter.

But what makes this so hurtful is that it pours salt on two other current Nets wounds. The first is the backup point guard situation. As I pointed out on Wednesday, Lawrence Frank made a rather pointed vote of no-confidence in Marcus Williams during the second half of Game 2, opting to use Carter as the de facto point guard while subbing Antoine Wright for Kidd and leaving Williams on the pine.

That was a none-too-subtle response to Williams’s defensive shortcomings in the first half of that game, but now the Nets find themselves in a pickle. They can play Williams and hope his confidence wasn’t too bruised by the benching, or they can play Carter as the de facto point guard again and risk the ragged play that marked his brief stint on Tuesday.

Neither option is terribly palatable, but playing Williams appears the more likely scenario. Even in the likely event that Kidd plays, Frank probably will lean on Williams for 15–20 minutes off the bench to ease the strain on Kidd’s knee. Certainly he noticed the fact that Toronto went on a 10-0 run on Tuesday during the stretch where Williams normally would have played.

But whether it’s a subpar Kidd or a struggling Williams, this is not a forgiving opponent. One of Toronto’s greatest strengths is the quickness of its two point guards, T.J. Ford and Jose Calderon, both of whom have given the Nets fits in the first two games. In fact, it was Williams’s inability to stop Calderon that got him in Frank’s doghouse Tuesday. Kidd wasn’t faring a whole lot better even on two good knees, so if he suits up and his lateral movement is compromised the Raps will pick-and-roll him to death.

Meanwhile, if Kidd isn’t able to provide his usual transition spark at the offensive end, it puts even more pressure on Vince Carter to produce points in the halfcourt offense. Alas, this has been the Nets’ other major failing. Carter is shooting only 30.2% from the floor in the first two games, falling into his bad habit of settling for long jump shots rather than challenging the defense by going to the basket. That explains why he’s only taken 10 foul shots in the first two contests.

Certainly, the tenacious defense of Toronto’s Anthony Parker has been a factor. Though not a household name because he played overseas the past five years, Parker is one of the game’s best defenders at his position. But it’s not like this is the first defensive specialist Carter has faced off against. Every team puts its top wing defender on him, and he normally puts up much better results than he did in the first two games.

The need for Carter to step up is all the more urgent because the Nets didn’t get a lot of help from the supporting cast in Game 2. While Bostjan Nachbar continues his completely unexpected second-half surge, key players like Richard Jefferson and Mikki Moore struggled.

Jefferson at least can point to his 28-point outburst in Game 1 as an encouraging sign, but we’re still waiting on Moore’s excuse. The hustle points and scrappy garbage baskets that have defined his game all season have been mysteriously absent thus far, replaced mostly by 16-foot jumpers that the Raptors are only too happy to let him take.

Of course, Toronto has some questions of its own heading into tonight, especially regarding its nonexistent bench output. All but 14 of the Raptors’ points in the series thus far have come from just four players: Ford, Calderon, Parker, and Chris Bosh.

Toronto normally counts on three sharpshooters off the bench for supplemental offense -— Juan Dixon, Morris Peterson, and Andrea Bargnani — but all three have struggled. Dixon’s lack of size and muscle makes him difficult to match up against Carter or Jefferson, so he’s hardly played. Peterson showed little spark in an extended Game 2 stint and will likely play far less tonight. And Bargnani has been positively disastrous, forcing shots with no rhyme or reason while getting abused defensively.

So the story for tonight may be which missing link takes the step forward — either Carter for the Nets, or the bench for the Raptors. I say “may” because all of that takes a back seat to Kidd’s status. If the Nets’ fearless leader can’t play at somewhat near his normal level, then none of the other factors matter. Toronto’s point guards are so quick, and Williams so slow, that it’s tough to imagine New Jersey prevailing with Kidd in street clothes.

Unfortunately, there’s a chance that may happen. And don’t think this is a one-shot deal either. Even if Kidd plays, there’s only 48 hours of recovery time heading into Game 4 — which means it’s possible Kidd will be in worse shape on Sunday than he is tonight. In what’s been a snakebit season for the Nets, one wonders if they were just dealt their final bad break.

jhollinger@nysun.com