He received some of the biggest cheers when he took the floor at Salt Lake Community College for the Rocky Mountain Revue Tuesday night.

No, he's just an undrafted free agent trying to find a place in the NBA.

But the crowd treated former Utah State star Jaycee Carroll like he was the most important guy on the floor and the ex-Aggie gave them a performance he could be proud of.

"I was pretty happy with how everything went," Carroll said. "It was good that I was able to get off to a good start early and the team played well. We just let it slip away at the end."

Carroll and the New Jersey squad he signed with for the summer blasted out to an early advantage and went up by as many as 14 points.

But when Carroll went to the bench late in the third quarter, the Jazz went on a run to make it a close contest.

In the final period, the game remained close until the final minute when Utah made all the big plays and pulled away to get the 87-79 win.

Carroll paced the Nets with 22 points and said he was pleased with everything except the result.

"The loss wasn't part of the 'dream' business," he said.

As the product of a local university, Carroll was warmly welcomed by the crowd in Salt Lake City to the point that the teammates had some fun with it.

"They were teasing me, saying that I must have a really big family out there," Carroll said.

As well as he played in Tuesday's contest, Carroll has plenty to prove if he hopes to make an NBA team including demonstrating he can adjust to playing point guard instead of the shooting guard position.

"It's a continual adjustment," said New Jersey summer league coach Brian Hill. "It's one of the hardest things to do, to go from off-guard to the point. He's doing a good job running the team but he also still has the score-first mentality sometimes."

The former Aggie knows that he needs to get that down as well as put the ball consistently into the net.

"I need to shoot the ball well and not turn it over," he explained. "I also need to do better on defense. I did pretty well in the first half but struggled in the second half."

Carroll has been on the road with the Nets for over three weeks and he said he's getting tired of the restaurants and the hotels, but he's chasing a dream.

"It's a great opportunity to play in front of NBA coaches and with NBA players," he said. "It helps me see what I need to do."

Part of what needs to happen, according to Hill, comes down to luck.

"It's about being in the right place at the right time," Hill said. "If it doesn't work out this year, than maybe it will next."

Carroll said that he's willing to explore other options if things don't work out.

"I'm taking it one day at a time," the ex-Utah State star said. "I'll definitely be willing to play in Europe and have had contact with some teams. Some people save up to go over their for a month and I could go there with my wife and play basketball.

"Right now, though, I'm focused on seeing how far I can go with the NBA."

Carroll and the Nets will finish their Revue schedule against Dallas at 4:30 p.m. on Thursday, while the Jazz will next meet Atlanta at 7 p.m. that same evening before finishing up Friday against the Mavericks.

• Jared Lloyd can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it