A stubborn Wollongong Hawks went down fighting 88-84 in last night's road meeting with the Gold Coast Blaze.
The defeat followed Friday night's heart-breaking 71-70 away loss to Cairns and allowed the Blaze to leap into top spot at Wollongong's expense.
Hawks guard Tywain McKee (24 points, five assists) had a chance to send the game into overtime but his three-point attempt with six seconds remaining was off target.
Full coverage of the Wollongong Hawks Wollongong guard Rhys Martin was forced to foul Gold Coast guard Tyson Demos moments later, and the former Illawarra junior clinched victory by sinking one of two free throws.
After falling behind by 12 early in the fourth quarter, McKee nailed a three to give his side an 82-81 lead with 2min42sec on the clock.
But the Hawks were unable to contain Ayinde Ubaka (28 points, five assists) down the stretch, slipping to 9-7 for the season and into a tie for second with Perth.
The visitors tried hard to cover the hole left by the absence of injured centre Larry Davidson, with Cam Tragardh scoring 17 points and Tim Behrendorff and Dave Gruber combining for 16 points and 12 rebounds.
But after patiently establishing a double-digit lead, the Blaze did just enough to deny their opponents down the stretch.
The Hawks will try to bounce back in Saturday's away game against struggling Melbourne, before returning home for a New Year's Eve confrontation with Adelaide.
They will bring in the New Year with a four-hour flight to Perth and take on the Wildcats on January 2 at Challenge Stadium.
Last night, both coaches re-jigged their starting line-ups, with Gold Coast's Joey Wright promoting the defensive-minded Demos in place of Ubaka.
Hawks coach Gordie McLeod also made a surprise move, elevating Dave Gruber into the starting five and putting Tim Behrendorff back to the bench.
Initially slow to get going, Wollongong launched a 13-2 run to lead 21-13.
The Blaze hit a couple of shots to claw their way back, but the visitors held their nerve to be ahead 23-20 after one quarter.
Wollongong managed to protect their lead for more than five minutes of the second period before the Blaze regained the upper hand on Mika Vukona's basket.
Ubaka seemed to have a point to prove in an unaccustomed back-up role, quickly racking up 10 points after sitting for almost the entire opening quarter.
Behrendorff's basket briefly restored Wollongong's lead, but the home team had all the momentum over the final minutes of the half and Ubaka added an exclamation point with a long-range three on the buzzer to put his side up 46-40 at the main break.
Hopes of a comeback seemed remote when James Harvey nailed back-to-back jump-shots and Ubaka knocked down his third three-pointer to increase the margin to 13.
But McLeod used a time-out to galvanise his troops and they immediately took aim with 11 unanswered points.
Petrie's basket broke the drought for Gold Coast, but the Hawks were back in the hunt.
They did their best to keep eating into the deficit, only to watch the Blaze make key baskets to stretch the margin to 10 at three-quarter time.
Despite defiantly climbing back off the ropes to take the lead late in the final period, the Hawks fell agonisingly short of victory.
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