Following their successful trip to London, the Nets hope to continue this season -– and recent stretch -- of firsts when they return to playing basketball in North America tomorrow.

With Golden State visiting the Prudential Center, the Nets will try to register their first three-game winning streak in more than two years. Their last three-game win streak came when Brook Lopez was a rookie, Devin Harris was an All-Star and Vince Carter’s presence and passing made both players better.

In Deron Williams, the Nets have that kind of player every game now. Well, almost every game.

For the next two games, Williams is NWT –- Not With Team.

This has nothing to do with his strained right wrist. Williams played nearly 88 minutes in the Nets’ two wins in London last week. The All-Star point guard is fine. He went home to Dallas to be with his wife for the birth of their fourth child.

The Nets are going to have to try and pull this off without Williams. If they do, it will be their first win on U.S. soil since the trade deadline. They’ll have to wait until next week to try for Williams’ first win as a Net in the United States.

Williams is a big part of many of the Nets’ firsts this season and recently. He is the first superstar and Top-10 player that they have had in at least five years. And, due in large part to him, they became the first NBA team to win regular-season games in Europe, and the first to win and lose a triple-OT game in the same season since the 1997-98 Suns.

Everything is about Williams right now for the Nets, and it will be going forward. Although the next two games are about finding ways to win without him.

The big picture, though, is about keeping Williams happy and healthy and about what he does for his teammates mentally and physically.

You’re seeing how Williams has elevated Lopez’s game and Kris Humphries' play. You’re seeing the Nets play with as much confidence and belief as they have all season. They easily could have lost both games against the Raptors, but they fought and gutted out the two wins, including the triple-OT victory Saturday.

“There was one point in the mid-fourth, I was looking up at the scoreboard and we were down about eight,”  Lopez said. “To be honest I wasn’t too worried. I thought we would win the game. I was confident that we’d pull through. We had sort of a concentration that had been missing for a while that we found and it helps us late in the games. We’re very focused.”

Our guess is there are two reasons for this: one is Williams’ presence and the other is the Nets know this is their roster for the rest of the season.

Something like that can’t be overlooked, when you consider how much the Nets have been through this season. Other than Lopez, Humphries and maybe Jordan Farmar, every player has been mentioned in trade rumors or has been traded this season.

The distractions were real. Guys were looking over their shoulders. This doesn’t mean the Nets suddenly are going to win their final 20 games, but you expect them to be more competitive in them because they want to end the season on a winning note and show they can be part of the future here.

Not everyone will be, but for the most part, the players are not thinking that way at this point. They want to continue to play the way they have the last few games and see if they can continue to win some games. But for the first time since the trade deadline, they will have to do it without their new leader and best player.

***

The rundown for tomorrow is no Williams, no Damion James (concussion), no Quinton Ross (back) and probably no Johan Petro (sick).

But Anthony Morrow (concussion) will be back.

***

Follow me on Twitter: @Al_Iannazzone

***

Al Iannazzone covers the Nets for The Record (Bergen County, N.J.)