And here we were worrying about how the Boston fans were going to treat the New Jersey Nets.

As it turned out, the ugliest scene during the Celtics' 94-76 loss last night was one of their own fans verbally attacking Boston forward Antoine Walker, haranguing him with pointed insults in the waning minutes, and eliciting an angry and frustrated reaction from Walker on the sideline.

The fan, identified as Stewart Berg, heckled Walker for most of the evening, imploring coach Jim O'Brien to substitute another player for him. O'Brien removed his All-Star forward with 4 minutes 42 seconds to play and the Celtics trailing by 24 points. At that point, Walker moved toward Berg, who was sitting to the right of the Celtics' bench, to confront him. Celtics security director Phil Lynch quickly intervened, at which point Walker said to Lynch, ''Let me go. Don't touch me. Don't touch me again.''