Deron Williams: Nets feel they're better than Heat

Deron Williams (left) has yet to beat the Heat as a Net. (Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images) The Nets have dropped 13 consecutive games to the Heat, including

Deron Williams (left) has yet to beat the Heat as a Net. (Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images)

The Nets have dropped 13 consecutive games to the Heat, including three lopsided losses last year and nine defeats in a row overall since LeBron James joined Miami in 2010. But Deron Williams likes new-look Brooklyn's chances against the two-time defending champions this year.

"I don't know if we felt we were a better team than the Heat last year," Williams told ESPNNewYork.com. "And so I think in order for us to be able to beat them this year, we have to feel like we are a better team and we can beat them. And I think we do."

Williams and the Nets (0-1) -- who added Kevin Garnett, Paul Pierce, Jason Terry and Andrei Kirilenko in the offseason -- can start to show that's the case when they play host to the Heat (1-1) on Friday. The bad blood between the teams is already boiling. In an Oct. 18 preseason game, Pierce delivered a hard foul to LeBron James. "That's going to [be] our identity," Pierce said afterward. "It's a message to the league."

Before that game, James suggested that Pierce, Garnett and Doc Rivers were perhaps a little hypocritical for leaving the Celtics one year after they criticized former Boston guard Ray Allen for signing with the Heat. Garnett fired back, saying LeBron should “worry about Miami.”

Dwyane Wade

is expected to make his Nets debut