Brighton Bears ended their ten-match losing run with a last-gasp 69-68 win at defending play-off champions Manchester Giants with Dave Wahl centre stage.

Wahl appeared to be punched by Giant Mark Robinson with 14 seconds left and Bears trailing before he clinched victory with less than a second to go.

Bears put behind them the disappointments of the last eight weeks to just clinch victoryt against a Giants team who had won five of their previous seven games.

Mark Dunning's men withstood a late challenge from the hosts to give themselves only their fourth win of the season, having produced a fine third quarter in what was a very tough defensive game. With guard Michael Brown still ruled out due to a thigh injury, Demetric Reese hit 19 points while forward Kevin Wallace stepped up to hit 18 points and also pulled down 13 rebounds.

Encouragingly for Bears, they out-rebounded Giants by 42 to 29 and their 16 turnovers was an improvement on the 22 made at Thames Valley the week before.

Giants led 22-17 after the first quarter and 34-31 at the break, before Bears outscored them 22-12 to enter the final period 53-46 ahead.

The hosts then produced a 13-0 run but Bears later responded with a 9-0 tear of their own, four of them coming from Wallace, to lead by 67-62.

Giants nosed back in front with a 6-0 run and there was drama when Whal was attacked by Robinson after a foul by the Bear on the Giant.

Robinson missed both his free throws and Bears' Danny Hildreth then slotted one to tie the scores at 68-68.

Bears got the ball back and a foul by Justin Phoenix on Wahl with less than a second left allowed Wahl to win the match for Bears at the line. He hit his second attempt after missing the first.

Giants scorers: Earl 19, Reese 17, Phoenix 11, Graves 8, Gottfried 8, Johnson 3, Robinson 2.

Bears scorers: Reese 19, Wallace 18, Johnson 11, Seaman 8, Wahl 7, Hildreth 6.

Bears' hopes of securing back to back victories for the first time this season were shattered as Sheffield Sharks continued their remarkable winning run over them last night.

Sharks' 90-63 success at the Sheffield Arena represented their 25th consecutive victory over Bears going back five years. This was the third time they have beaten them this season.

Bears veteran former Sheffield centre Wilbur Johnson had the consolation of leading all scorers with 21 points and also grabbed nine rebounds as his team reached the halfway point of the season with just four wins.

Sharks shot the ball a lot better, returning 52 per cent from the floor against 42 per cent. They hit 20 points from Bears' 31 turnovers while Brighton managed only eight points from Sharks' 20 turnovers.

Bears, six points adrift at the bottom of the Southern Conference, flopped with their outside shooting, managing only two of nine attempts against nine of 23 by the home side.

Sharks made a fast start and a 13-0 tear helped them into a 17-2 lead after five minutes.

They were 28-13 in front at the end of the first quarter but Bears outscored their opponents 24-21 to trail 49-37 at the break. Sharks led 51-40 early in the third quarter and Sheffield stretched their lead to 29.

Sharks scorers: McKinney 19, Myers 17, Reinking 12, Windle 11, Scantlebury 8, Flournoy 7, Bennett 6, Bridge 5, Payne 3, Kennedy 2.

Bears scorers: Johnson 21, Wahl 16, Wallace 11, Wright 7, Reese 6, Paculabo 2.