Misfiring on 51 of their 78 field goal attempts, the Bandits surrendered an 11-point lead in the second quarter at the Rowland Cowan Stadium amid a litany of errant passes and a lack of defensive intensity.

The defeat was Albury- Wodonga’s fourth straight road loss and left the Border outfit with a 6-4 record in the SEABL’s East conference.

“It wasn’t a great night for us,” Chalmers said.

“It was a sloppy game and we cooled off, defensively we weren’t as sharp as we should have been.

“Offensively, we had no flow, looked a little lost and that really shouldn’t be happening.

“We lacked focus, we shot 34 per cent for the game, just a very stagnant performance.”

The Bandits were led by Deba George and Donte Nicholas, who each scored 18 points, while Daniel Sepokas and Alex Bogart-King added 15 and 12 points respectively.

But it was a rough night for import Cory Dixon, who could only hit four of his 17 attempts to finish with just 11 points, although he did add a game-high 12 rebounds before fouling out.

Spartans point guard Isaih Tueta top-scored for the hosts with 17 points and small forward Anthony Olah chimed in with 15 points off the bench.

To compound Albury- Wodonga’s shooting woes, it was again a night of misery for the Bandits at the charity stripe, with 16 missed free throws from a whopping 36 attempts. And Chalmers couldn’t hide his frustration at the elementary errors.

“It’s clearly an opportunity wasted,” Chalmers said.

“No discredit to Brisbane but we should be beating them.

“It’s really a game we should’ve taken but we didn’t.

“Free throws are easy scoreboard pressure, we’re not making teams pay, we could’ve been up 15 or 16 points and that’s frustrating because that would’ve put the game out of reach.

“It really was a comedy of errors for us all night.”

The Bandits now have a two-week break until their next match, a home clash against East conference power Geelong that also serves as the annual Allen McCowan tribute game.