After a strong opening quarter, the Heat were outscored 53 to 29 in the second and third periods before eventually going on to lose 88-80 to Goulburn.

The loss leaves the Heat sitting at 0-3 entering the Easter break and player-coach Zac Maloney said a poor mentality had led to the frustrating defeat.

"Yeah we're extremely disappointed," Maloney said.

"When you look at our season and you look at winnable games, that was right up there as one we needed to come away with.

"We well and truly could have, we got off to a firing start and we were out 20 to five at some stage there in the first quarter.

"We started out really hot out of the blocks and then our mentality we have an issue with kicked in and we packed up our clubs and thought we'd done enough in the first quarter to coast.

"It was humbling for the boys to see that we can't afford to do that, the second and third quarter we were very lacklustre.

"I think we had less than 10 points in the second quarter and I couldn't tell you what we had in the third.

"We fired back up there, I think at one stage it was 18 points and we made it a close game towards the end.

"But it was all too late and looking at the season it makes our life very hard, I know we've only played three games but we've been here too many times before.

"We know how this story goes when you lose winnable games, that means you are going to have to try and pluck a very tough game where the odds are stacked against you at some point this season.

"We'll get back to the drawing board on Tuesday night, but I think a lot of it was just our mentality.

"It's been our achilles heel this year and in the previous few years as well, we show that we can mix it with some of the best teams in the competition and we have a really good team.

"It's just the belief we have in ourselves and just that mentality to be able to stay focused for 40 minutes of a game."

Maloney had an outstanding game in his 200^th appearance for the Heat scoring 34 points while Angus Lourey was the only other player to enter double digits with 12.

Adding to the woes for the Heat was losing Eddie Merkel to a knee injury very early in the contest against the Bears.

Maloney was unsure of the exact diagnosis for Merkel but was hopeful that he would receive good news and be available for their next game on April 6 against Moss Vale.

"I think it may be a little bit more serious," he said.

"He'll get checked out this week but it was a collision with the knee that turned it in and it was pretty ugly to see.

"He was down for a little bit but got up and kept trying to soldier on.

"He can put some weight on it today which is a good sign, but I think something keeps clicking out of place there.

"So he'll go to the physio I'm hoping first thing tomorrow or Tuesday and it'll be a very nervous wait to see what's going to happen there."

Goulburn Bears 88 d Wagga Heat 80 (Z Maloney 34, A Lourey 12)