The Sunshine Coast Lightning were provided with a reality check at their first home game of the season.
After toppling both Melbourne teams on the road, the Kylee Byrne-coached outfit was rattled 69-54 by West Coast at USC Stadium.
The Fever are now the only undefeated team in the competition and are quickly making up lost ground, after being stripped 12 points for breaching the salary cap in 2018 and 2019.
The Lightning started the contest in sharp fashion, escaping to a 21-12 lead on the back of Laura Scherian, Maddy McAuliffe and Steph Wood, but scores were locked at 31-all at half-time.
The hosts were overcome in the third quarter, and trailed 52-43 and struggled to make any headway in the last term.
West Coast star Jhaniele Fowler recorded 59 goals from 61 attempts.
While Lightning goal shooter Cara Koenen notched 28 goals from 30 attempts, she was largely kept at bay by Australian Diamonds team-mate Courtney Bruce, who had five intercepts and was named player of the match.
Meanwhile, Wood could only manage to hit one super shot, from five attempts.
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Bruce said they can take aim at the four-team finals, despite giving the rest of the eight-team competition a head start.
“We weren’t playing to our standards (in the first quarter) and (coach) Stacey (Marinkovich) went back at quarter-time and said, ‘we know what to do, get out there and pull your fingers out’,” she said.
“I wanted to contest a bit more cleanly and I think all my intercepts came from the hard work Stacey (Francis) and Jess (Anstiss) did out the front.”
The result continued the Lightning’s recent poor record against the Fever, having lost their past four encounters by large margins.
The Sunshine Coast will next host the NSW Swifts on May 23, at USC Stadium, 1pm.
