Home-grown Hawks guard Tyson Demos has wiped himself out of this Saturday's duel with Cairns after suffering a deep gash to his buttock while surfing.

Demos, who grew up in Wollongong and has always had a passion for surfing, copped a fin-chop during a regular weekend session.

The former Illawarra junior standout received 10 stitches and had to sit carefully on clock control at Monday's training.

Demos will miss the clash with the Taipans and hopes to return for the New Year's Eve home game against Perth.

Wollongong coach Gordie McLeod wouldn't have been too pleased to hear about Demos's misfortune but the 26-year-old's teammates saw the funny side.

"It doesn't look too comfortable. It's a pretty sizeable slice," Hawks captain Oscar Forman said.

"I saw a photo of it initially but today he showed us the real thing. He was happy to parade it around and show off his war wound.

"He nearly created a new crack for himself not far from his original crack. He's basically had to remodel his arse and move it over a little to the right."

Wollongong are stuck at the bottom of the ladder with a dismal 3-13 record.

Last Friday's five-point overtime home loss to Melbourne left the Hawks with the virtually impossible task of winning at least 10 of their final 12 games for the top four.

"It should never have gone to overtime. We should've been able to close that game out," Forman said.

"We did enough to have ourselves in the game but not enough to finish it off. The pleasing thing for us was the aggressive way we started and we really shared the ball, as best we have in a game yet, so we really need to continue that and make sure it's a focus moving forward."

Cairns have narrowly beaten the Hawks in two meetings this season by a combined six points.

"We know we match up well against Cairns and we've played them tough in the past," Forman said.

"We're due for a win against them but that's only going to come with hard work and putting our game plan into action and sticking to it for a full 40 minutes."

Forman hit 6/9 three-point shots in the loss to Melbourne and finished with 20 points. The Hawks made 14/24 threes as a team and grabbed 38 rebounds to Melbourne's 25.

But turnovers led to Wollongong's downfall. They had 18 to Melbourne's nine, costing them 23 points.