The flying Duck is back, and so are the Bears as a title-chasing team capable of winning games in style.

Now coach Nick Nurse wants them to build on Saturday's 37-point demolition of Birmingham Bullets as they tackle Newcastle Eagles at the Brighton Centre tonight (6pm) in what should be a cracker.

Skipper Randy Duck, on his home comeback from a hernia operation, hit 20 points against the Bullets and Bears led by as many as 46 as they closed the gap on British League leaders Sheffield Sharks.

It was fabulous to watch and, with Sheffield losing at London Towers, sets up things perfectly for tonight's contest.

All that talk of conceding the title and of injury crises seemed like weeks ago as Bears, and Duck in particular, moved up several gears from their hard fought success at Essex Leopards 24 hours previously.

Sterling Davis hit eight of nine from inside the arc for his game-high 25 points, Rico Alderson claimed 15 rebounds and 12 assists for another triple-double, Ralph Blalock was three-of-four from outside the arc and all five bench men got decent court time.

Of those, Errol Seaman, who seems to have benefitted from extra playing time he enjoyed during the recent injury problems, played half the game, pulling down seven rebounds and guiding home a couple of mid-range jump shots.

Jason Medford completed an and-one for his first home points and Oli Roche claimed five rebounds.

But coach Nick Nurse was pointing to Duck's name on the stats sheet as he assessed a thoroughly satisfying evening at the Triangle.

He said: "It was just what we needed and the biggest thing is this guy is back playing.

"He was struggling on Friday but this is a big boost to everybody.

"We are confident again. We got back to pressing and running and it was good to see. I thought we were really active, we rebounded well and we passed it well.

"The Sheffield result is awesome too. We were always going to be able to control our own destiny but now we certainly can.

"Newcastle is another big one because they are playing as well as anyone in the league. It will be a hell of a game to see."

Nurse added: "It's going to be a great three-team race going down the stretch and it doesn't get any more exciting than this."

Bears' display was certainly impressive, though Chester were just as good in winning at Scottish Rocks and will come to Brighton next Saturday with top spot in their sights.

The sorry Bullets have not won on all six of their visits to Burgess Hill and they looked doomed by the time Bears opened a 21-7 lead after seven minutes.

Duck received a tremendous ovation from home fans who were dismayed when his first three-point attempt rattled around the rim and bounced out.

He went on to miss just one of his subsequent five threes, the last of which pushed the lead out to 42 with 8:13 to go in the fourth quarter.

Bears had runs of 8-2 to start and 10-2 to finish the second quarter to take a 54-31 half-time lead, stretched it to 77-43 by the final interval and also held their own with all their bench on for the last seven-and-a-half minutes.

Duck, for the time being, is one of those bench players. He is not expected to start tonight but Saturday's 25 minutes of action will do him the world of good.

The skipper said: "Every day is going to get a little bit better. I need to get a bit more comfortable and confident but this was a good game for me because we didn't need to be so concentrated on the score. We could just play.

"We worked really hard, we played good defence and we had a good gameplan to lock down on their big guys and make it a perimeter game."

Bears will need to be equally tough against Newcastle stars like TJ Walker and Niki Arinze but, whatever happens tonight, the title bid is very much alive.

Bears: Davis 25, Duck 20, Johnson 12, Blalock 11, Alderson 10, Brown 8, Seaman 6, Johnston 3, Medford 3.

Birmingham Bullets: R. Griffin 15, K. Griffin 15, Jones 12, Windle 8, Phillips 6, Baah 5.