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It didn't take Player of the Week honors or an 80-foot by 60-foot billboard in Times Square for the Wizards to figure out how well Devin Harris has been playing lately.

That's what game tapes are for, and last night the Wizards gave the rest of the NBA a primer on how to slow down Harris and Vince Carter -- at least until their teammates hit their outside shots.

Frank H. Conlon/The Star-LedgerYi Jianlian of the Nets tries to block a dunk by the Washington Wizards Javale McGee in the first half of Tuesday night's game at Izod Center.

This year, with the Nets once again returning home after a successful 3-1 trek out west only to lose another dispiriting game to another weak opponent, Vince Carter defiantly rejected the notion that all they had worked for had been washed away in 48 minutes of slop.

"It was just one of those nights," Carter declared after the Nets lost, 108-88, to the Wizards Tuesday night. "I refuse to believe that we took a step back."

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Devin Harris seemed rather unimpressed with himself for winning much-deserved NBA Eastern Conference Player of the Week honors. He did note, however, that the award reflected the success of the team as a whole.

"It just means that we had a good road trip," he said before Tuesday night's game against Washington. "If we don't win those games, then we're not looking at any awards or anything like that. It was a good weekend for us. We didn't start the trip out really well, but we ended on a good note."

Lawrence Frank doesn't mean to be a downer; it's just his job. As coach of a team that is defying expectations and surpassing preset standards, it is Frank's duty to splash a little icy water on all the euphoria.

Of course he's proud of what his team accomplished out west, and told them so at yesterday's shoot-around. He's also happy the team took a 9-7 record into Tuesday night's game because, well, it's better than 7-9.

Rick Scuteri/Associated PressNets guard Devin Harris, left, drives past the Suns' Steve Nash during the second quarter of Sunday's game in Phoenix.

That's what you call a pretty good day -- two symbolic proclamations that Harris has arrived as an elite NBA player, even though that was fairly well-established after he had destroyed two of the game's greatest point guards for 81 points on back-to-back nights.

It was the method that was perhaps most impressive: One night after using a hobbled Deron Williams like a turnstile in Salt Lake City, where Harris got to the rim at will, he mostly dropped jumpers on a helpless Steve Nash in Phoenix when he recognized how much air space he was getting.

Roy Dabner/EPADevin Harris surpassed his previous career-high of 38 points.

PHOENIX -- They were down 11 entering the fourth quarter this time, when Devin Harris figured he might as well wreck somebody else's homecourt advantage before he heads home.

So with charity toward none, and malice toward all defenders wearing white with purple trim, the Nets' point guard destroyed the Phoenix Suns for 21 of his career-high 47 points in the final period, which merely raises more questions.

Such as: When is this all going to end?

The Nets put the finishing touches on a brilliant, coming-of-age road trip Sunday night, getting yet another career night (in a month filled with them) from their leader, and a strong defensive stand in the endgame that finally dropped the Suns, 117-109, at US Airways Center.

George McNish/The Star-LedgerBill Cartwright, sitting with Jason Kidd back in their Nets days, says the Nets of today are playing well "for what they're doing."

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PHOENIX -- Bill Cartwright, who has never been surprised by anything in his life, raised an eyebrow.

For Mr. Bill -- former Nets assistant coach, and now Terry Porter's right hand with the Suns -- this is a veritable uproar.

"They're playing good. Give them credit," Cartwright said of the Nets, an hour before Sunday night's tipoff at US Airways Center. "And Devin (Harris) is obviously playing really well right now. This open action they're running allows him and Vince (Carter) to handle the ball a lot."

Bill Kostroun/Associated PressVince Carter thinks the only way to keep Devin Harris in check might be to foul him, as the Clippers' Baron Davis did last week.

PHOENIX -- How would you guard you?

Devin Harris laughed. He can expect a lot of these trite, existential questions from here on out. When you're the seventh-leading scorer in the league, and you're dropping in more than 27 points over your last nine games on only (this is the extraordinary part) 14.5 shots, inquiring minds want to know whether this is a permanent arrangement.

"I really can't answer that," Harris said.

If you haven't just beamed in from Alpha Centauri, you may have noticed that Devin Harris is one of the hottest players in the league.

This hot, to be precise: In his past nine games, he has averaged 27.2 points and 6.4 assists -- so unguardable off the dribble that he has moved into second place in the NBA in free-throw attempts with 11.4 per game (a shade behind Dwight Howard's 12.1).

"It's not a secret anymore that Devin Harris is one of the better players in our league," Keyon Dooling said after Harris had what has become a typical night (34 points, six assists) against Utah. "With the ball in his hands he is pretty much indefensible."

Box score

Newspaper articles

Nets move above .500

Sweating Yi's summer plans in China

Notes: Ailing Boone sent home

Post-game notes: Harris on hot streak

Douglas C. Pizac/Associated PressDevin Harris was unstoppable against the Jazz, notching 34 points, five assists and four rebounds in 35 minutes.

So there they were in an isolation stare-down near the top of the key, out of the Nets' open set, which was textbook stuff all night: Harris looked at Deron Williams as if he felt sorry for him, took two hard dribbles to his right, and then made a hard, spin-back pivot and floated a shot over Mehmet Okur into the net.

It was the Nets point guard's third straight score against the helpless Williams, who was playing with a sore ankle -- and a reminder that when one elite point guard goes up against another with a bad wheel, this is the result:

Nets 105, Utah 88.

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SALT LAKE CITY -- Josh Boone's trip ended before it even started, as the slow healing rate of his right ankle contusion convinced the team to send him home Saturday morning.

The Nets center, who suffered the injury Nov. 12 against Indiana, had hoped to stay on this trip, which concludes Sunday night in Phoenix. Instead, his only reward for all the rehab he's done the past two weeks is a visit to the doctor Monday morning, when he'll get an MRI.

"Josh was kind of making progress, making progress ... and now he's kind of been in a holding pattern the last three days," coach Lawrence Frank said before Saturday night's meeting with Utah. "Obviously, we wouldn't have sent him home if we thought he was ready."

Noah K. Murray/The Star-LedgerThe last thing the Nets want is for Yi Jianlian to undergo a grueling training routing in China this summer.

Easy answer: The Nets will do cartwheels, and Yi can do whatever he wants with his offseason, even if it involves riding the roller-coaster at Wildwood Crest for two months.

But what happens if Yi stays on his present path -- which is meandering at best -- and is still in glaring need of consistency and skill development?

Noah K. Murray/The Star-LedgerAtlanta Hawks coach Mike Woodson called the Nets' Brook Lopez, center, "a load" earlier this year.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Brook Lopez returned to his boyhood home in Fresno for a holiday meal Thursday, and if he was looking for people who might make a fuss over a stunningly dramatic career arc, he went to the wrong place.

Friends filed in all day and all night, but did they happen to mention anything NBA-related? Didn't come up. Maybe in passing, as in, "How about them Lakers?"

This is what happens when you hang around with other world-class athletes -- swimmers and water polo players, mostly -- who would just as soon talk about the old days.

Rich Pedroncelli/Associated PressNets guard Devin Harris takes a three-point shot that ties the game in the closing seconds of the fourth quarter against the Sacramento Kings in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday.

So he was given a choice Wednesday night against the Kings: He could either revisit those days, when mental toughness was his only barrier to stardom; or he could face the music and start dancing.

He chose the latter, after recognizing that he had no choice at all.