Sitting third on the Division One Waratah League ladder after eight games, the Blaze were expected to comfortably account for the seventh-placed Bears.

Goulburn had other ideas and scrapped their way to a gritty 52-40 win at Goulburn Basketball Stadium, shifting Wagga down to fourth and pulling themselves up to sixth on the competition table.

Blaze coach Peter O’Leary delivered a blunt assessment of his team’s performance.

“Our shooting was really bad out at Goulburn,” O’Leary said.

“Shakera Barnes and Jess Sommerville went alright but everyone else struggled.”

The Blaze entered the contest without a number of regulars including Steph Male, Abbey Morton, Amelia Hassett and Summa Stephens but O’Leary was nevertheless unimpressed with his side’s form at the basket.

“We’re a 60-point team at least and hopefully we start scoring a few more points,” he said.

“We really lacked that offensive pairing and hopefully we can redeem ourselves out there next week.”

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