The Brooklyn Nets were successful in their playoff debut Saturday night, and look to go up 2-0 in their Eastern Conference quarterfinal series when they host the Chicago Bulls tonight at Barclays Center.

Tonight’s game can be seen live on WWOR-TV My9, and it will be another true “Blackout in Brooklyn” as all fans have a black rally towel awaiting them at their seats.

The Nets won Saturday’s Game 1 by a 106-89 margin and never trailed in a game where their lead ballooned as large as 28 at one point. Deron Williams had a strong game, scoring a team-high 22, and Brooklyn piled up a lot of points in transition, avoiding’s Chicago’s defensive strength in the process.

“You don’t like to play when their defense is set up; guaranteed everybody that plays Chicago, that’s one of the first things you write up on the board,” Nets interim coach P.J. Carlesimo said. “When they get set up, you’re in trouble.”

In terms of that transition success, Carlesimo credited his own defense as well as Williams for maintaining a good pace.

“Two things happened for us the other night; one, they didn’t shoot particularly well in the first half so we weren’t taking the ball out of bounds,” Carlesimo said, “and Deron and our team did a well above average job of getting the ball up the floor so we weren’t playing against the usual Chicago defense. They were spread out all over the floor and that makes a huge difference.”

As for Williams himself, the point guard carried his strong second half into the first playoff game, and Bulls head coach Tom Thibodeau had high praise for the opposing point man.

“He’s got his explosion back, he’s a big guard – powerful and quick – and he has the ability to make the right play; it’s not only his scoring (you worry about), but he also gets easy baskets for other people,” Thibodeau said. “You can tell he’s gotten his confidence back, too, so that makes him much harder to guard because you have to give him space. Guys like that, you have to make them work.”

On the front line, the Bulls will once again be without the “full” services of All-Star Joakim Noah, who is still dealing with plantar fasciitis and is on a minutes limit of “about 20-25” according to Thibodeau. Taj Gibson and perhaps even Nazr Mohammad will be leaned on heavily to help Noah and Carlos Boozer out in defending Brook Lopez and boxing out Reggie Evans, and Thibodeau himself noted that even when fully healthy, the Nets present a big challenge defensively.

“They’re playing at a very high level, and the way they finished the season, Deron Williams is rolling and he runs the team great,” Thibodeau said. “They have a number of guys who can run the ball off the dribble, and you have Lopez who has great touch and plays well with his back to the basket. They have good quality depth so they test you in a lot of ways, and you have to finish your defense against these guys; if you relax at all, they’ll make you pay.”

Injuries have affected the Bulls from day one, with Derrick Rose missing the whole season and a number of guys sitting out long stretches due to injury, but that’s something Thibodeau has dealt with before – recalling past instances of being without a superstar during his time as an assistant in Houston (Yao), Boston (Garnett) and New York (Ewing) – and he knows it can’t be an excuse once you’ve gotten this far.

“We’ve dealt with it all season long, and that’s part of the challenge – not just in how quickly you can adapt to things, but also how you adapt to guys coming back,” Thibodeau said. “We’re fortunate now that we do have a lot of guys a lot healthier than they were earlier in the season, which is a plus, but we have to get into rhythm quickly. Offensively it’s timing and spacing, defensively it’s intensity and protecting each other.”

All that said, the Bulls will surely come out looking to gain momentum early, and coach Thibodeau knows that it starts with his defense.

“We were disappointed obviously in the way we played, so we understand the importance of the game, and we know that we’re going to have to play a lot better than we did in Game 1,” Thibodeau said. “The challenge is to play for 48 minutes. We can’t allow missed shots to take away from our energy on defense and in rebounding; we have to play all aspects of the game.”

And, as Carlesimo knows, the Nets can’t be complacent coming in, because the tide can always change in a hurry.

“We gave up 54 points in the second half…it’s never a challenge for coaches to find things to be critical of or to work on, and we have a lot of things that we can do better,” Carlesimo said. “But, if we can shoot and take care of the ball the way we did the other night, that will cover up a lot of execution mistakes, and when you score that many points, that gives your defense a heck of a cushion.”

Follow Lou DiPietro on Twitter: @LouDiPietroYES