So much for the new and improved Nets.

Despite the addition of Vince Carter and the return of Richard Jefferson, the Nets came no closer to beating the Miami Heat in yesterday’s opening game of their first-round playoff series than they did in their three one-sided regular season losses. The 116-98 defeat should send coach Lawrence Frank scurrying back to the drawing board to try to reverse New Jersey’s fortunes in time for Tuesday’s Game 2.

The frightening part for the Nets is that Shaquille O’Neal wasn’t a big factor. The Heat’s behemoth put up 17 points and 11 rebounds, but the undersized Nets can live with those numbers. While O’Neal didn’t dominate, that seemed more out of disinterest than any lingering complications from a thigh bruise that had kept him out for the final week of Miami’s regular season. Shaq soared for a one-handed alley-oop dunk in the opening minutes, establishing his presence with authority. Nonetheless, Miami coach Stan Van Gundy wisely limited his big man to 32 minutes, since his efforts weren’t going to be needed in such a lopsided game.

Instead, it was Miami’s backcourt that ravaged the Nets’ defense. Guards Dwyane Wade and Damon Jones combined for 62 points, on a sizzling 22-for-30 shooting. That Wade shredded the Nets for 32 points shouldn’t be a big surprise, because that matchup has always been a problem for them. The Nets used a variety of defenders on Wade, but none were able to keep him out of the paint. When New Jersey switched against pick-and-roll plays, the big men helping against Wade were a step slow.

The Nets can survive a big game from Wade, but they can’t survive a journeyman like Jones pouring in another 30. Playing on his ninth team in seven years, Jones had only one 30-point game all season. The Nets, though, seemed to forget the scouting report on Jones – race out at him and make him put the ball on the floor. Instead, New Jersey’s rotation out to him was consistently late; allowed to fire away with impunity, Jones made 7-of-9 3-point attempts.

Jones certainly is a deadly 3-point shooter – he shot 42.9% on the season and 38.9% for his career – but his big game owed much to the attention New Jersey lavished on O’Neal and Wade. This is the dilemma of playing against the Heat: All five offensive players are good enough that opponents must cover them. While Nets’ opponents can slack off against a Jason Collins or Brian Scalabrine to double- and triple-team Vince Carter, doing so against Miami invites somebody like Jones or Udonis Haslem to light up the scoreboard.

Say this for Lawrence Frank: He never stopped trying different alignments in the hope that one of them would spark. Early on, he tried to use Jason Kidd on post-ups against the shorter Jones, but when Kidd couldn’t hit those shots, Frank had to abandon that play. Then he experimented with zone defenses after the Heat tore up his man-to-man alignment, but that didn’t produce any better results. Later he went with a pint-size lineup of Kidd, Jefferson, Travis Best, Vince Carter, and Nenad Krstic to try to increase the tempo, but the Nets again failed to ignite.

That may have been the worst part of all from New Jersey’s perspective. Miami completely choked off the Nets’ running game, which is a bad omen for the rest of the series. Battling against a monster like Shaq, the Nets’ best hope is to turn this series into a track meet and let Kidd, Jefferson, and Carter run the Heat ragged. New Jersey flopped in that regard, failing to get a single fast-break basket in the first half as Miami rolled out to a 12-point lead. Though New Jersey finished with 16 fast-break points, many of those came long after the outcome had been decided.

Despite all that, the Nets’ offense would have been good enough to win had it been joined by competent defense. The club committed only eight turnovers, shot 10-of-22 on 3s, and finished with 98 points – not a maestro performance, but not horrendous. Yet in a rarity for the Nets under Frank, the defense was abysmal. They allowed Miami to shoot 59% for the game and forced only eight turnovers. Even if we exclude Wade and Jones, the other Heat players shot 20-for-41. At times, it seemed Miami’s biggest problem was choosing whose turn it was to score.

Considering the Game 1 carnage, what can Frank possibly do for Game 2? One option immediately comes to mind. The Nets’ primary objectives on Tuesday are to step up their defense of the Heat guards and to increase the tempo. On both counts, one move seems obvious: replacing Scalabrine with Best in the starting lineup, thereby moving Kidd to shooting guard and Carter to small forward. The match-ups in this series are horrible for Scalabrine, who had to guard Jones for much of the first quarter but couldn’t make use of his height advantage offensively. Best, on the other hand, scored 11 points in 25 minutes of action and played competently at the defensive end, too.

Best is only a temporary solution, keeping the spot warm until Jefferson is ready to resume starting at small forward. Unfortunately, that time is probably a few games away. Jefferson missed the last 49 games of the regular season with a wrist injury, and his return to live action was wobbly. One of his first shots caromed wildly off the backboard, and only a couple of generous whistles on forced drives to the basket gave him his final tally of nine points. Defensively, he often was asked to guard Wade but rarely did it well. One hopes Frank will select somebody else for that assignment in Game 2.

Overall, Jefferson’s injury-free return is the one distant bright spot in an otherwise dark playoff opener. New Jersey’s biggest concern at the start of the series was Shaq, but he did very little yesterday and the Nets still got smoked. They didn’t run, they didn’t stop Wade, and none of Frank’s adjustments made any difference. For Tuesday the Nets have a laundry list of improvements to make, or their surprise playoff appearance will be surprisingly brief.