Nets 93

Bucks 86

Byron Scott tried yelling. He tried the nice-guy approach. Nothing was working. So he hit the Nets where it hurts most: right smack in their pride.

Before last night’s game with the Bucks at the Meadowlands, Scott challenged his Nets, especially the stars.

Hey, Kenyon Martin, you’re an emotional and rebounding monster. Prove it.

Yo, Jason Kidd, you’re supposed to be the best point guard on the planet. Show me.

Richard Jefferson? Let me see why some think you’re a rising star. Kerry Kittles, shoot or sit.

“It was more or less, ‘Go out there and play the way you’re capable of playing,’ ” explained Kidd.

They did. With Scott’s job security perhaps riding on the success or failure of a rare back-to-back home set, the Nets responded. Martin had the first 20-20 game by a Net in nearly six years. Kidd registered his fourth triple-double of the season. Jefferson scored 18 points. Kittles led all Nets with 22.

And above all, the Nets won. At home. They ended a four-game overall losing streak while claiming victory for just the third time in nine tries at the Meadowlands, beating the Bucks, 93-86, before a snow-challenged crowd of about 3,000 (everyone was invited to the lower level).

“We showed life,” Scott said. “You feel and you hope that we have the message and we’ll come out and have the same effort we had tonight. We can play even better, even harder, but that’s what we strive for, consistency.”

At times, there were glimpses of the Nets of the past two seasons – Martin rebounding like a man possessed, grabbing a career-high-tying 21 in all, to go along with 20 points for the first Net 20-20 game since Jayson Williams on Jan. 23, 1998.

And there was Kidd directing all night while picking up 16 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds. Plus, Kittles and Jefferson were huge in an ultimately decisive 16-2 second-quarter run that made a six-point deficit an eight-point lead.

“For us winning, it’s good but it’s the way we win,” said Jefferson, who added eight rebounds. “Even though we’re very excited about the win, you still have to find areas you need to improve.”

So at times, there were flashes of the Nets of the past two weeks as they allowed the Bucks to make it interesting and climb within five in the fourth quarter after New Jersey (8-11) led by 17 in the third.

But always, the Nets found an answer for the likes of Michael Redd (24 points), Desmond Mason (19), Joe Smith (14 points, 10 rebounds) or Dan Gadzuric (10 points, six blocks).

Usually the answer involved Martin, who had his sixth double-double of the season but first in six games. He was emotional. He was unstoppable on the glass, and the Nets dominated the Bucks – who were without Tim Thomas, Toni Kukoc and Brain Skinner – 50-39.

“I challenged myself after the last game,” said Martin, who had eight offensive rebounds – matching his total of the previous five games.

“I had a long thinking session with myself, what I need to do in order to play the way I’m capable of playing. I had a talk with Byron and I gave him my word I would play the way I was capable of playing.”

Said Kidd (career triple-double No. 54): “We came out of the gates like the old Nets, in the sense of being the aggressors and being up-tempo and getting stops getting out and running and just having fun.”