The Bendigo Spirit are fed up with honourable losses.
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The Spirit have a 0-4 record through three rounds of the Women's National Basketball League yet they've been more than competitive in all four matches.
Sunday's 76-64 defeat to the Melbourne Boomers - after leading by double-figures going into the final quarter - stung coach Kennedy Kereama and the playing group the most of the early losses.
"We're getting into that honourable loss category and we don't want to be in that category,'' Kereama said.
"We're a better team than that. One of the assistant coaches and I went through the numbers to assess where the changes need to be made.
"The reality is there's a number of statistical categories where we're number one in the league or top two or even top four.
"Then there's some where we're way off the mark. We've been working on hanging our hats on how we defend - and scheme wise we've done a good job of keeping teams to low scores - but we need to improve our foul discipline.
"We send opponents to the foul line too often and teams are shooting their free throws at 81 per cent against us.
"We go to the foul line as much as any team in the league, apart from the Melbourne Boomers, but we're only shooting our free throws at 62 per cent.
"They're two things that we need to improve immediately."
Sunday's loss to the Boomers was the second leg of a testing road double.
The Spirit made the trip to Melbourne on the back of a loss to the Perth Lynx in Perth on Friday night.
Kereama said the travel and two games against high quality opponents were no excuse for the final term fadeout against the Boomers.
"There was fatigue, but that's why we trained five or six days a week in pre-season to build a lung capacity to cope and deal with that,'' Kereama said.
"That's pro sport. I understand some players played some big minutes in Perth and, maybe, I overplayed some players, too.
"Credit to the Boomers. They played a physical game and that's what they needed to do knowing that we'd come off a tough game against Perth."
The Spirit return to Red Energy Arena this Saturday for a home clash with the Sydney Flames.
To put it simply, the Spirit must win to gain some confidence and momentum.
"Sometimes when you're 0-4 it's hard to see a silver lining, but what I do see is a team of players that continue to compete.
"They're gritty and they continue to fight back. They're endeavour will never be under the microscope.
"Our next two games will be really telling. We play Sydney on our home court and statistically they are very similar to us.
"Last time when we played them I don't think we could have played a worse offensive game and we fell just short without our captain [Kelsey Griffin].
"Then we play Adelaide, who have a 2-2 record, but I genuinely think we're good enough to beat that team."
