The Tornadoes finished 63 points in arrears following a 94-80 loss to Eltham Wildcats.

That came on the back of losing not only to Frankston Blues by 47 points, but losing captain Stephanie Gardner, who was forced to watch the dual defeats on the sidelines.

"When we lose our leader like we did last night, it kind of just shocks the team," Washington said on Sunday.

"They knew what they had to do today, so at least they came out and fought."

The numbers on paper, at least, looked good.

Star Brittany Hodges had 27 points and 14 rebounds, Bec Abel shot 24 points - more than double her 10.83 season average - and Stella Beck added 14 points, nine rebounds and five assists.

But Gardner's knee injury left the Tornadoes down to a travelling two-player bench.

"Everybody knew what their role was going into the game and they executed how I wanted," Washington said.

"They rebounded well - we won the rebounds again. We won the second-chance points again. We just didn't capitalise off their turnovers and we didn't haven't any fast-break points. Our style of play is up and down.

"We need to get more points on the break. This is the second game we've got zero fast-break points."

Eltham pulled back an early deficit to head off the Tornadoes by two points at quarter-time before extending that to eight at half-time.

That blew out to 13 points inside the opening two plays of the third until the visitors rallied to score 23 of the next 33 points to draw level inside the next six minutes.

But the Torns could only score 12 last-quarter points when they already trailed by eight at the last change.

Washington still remains optimistic that things will come good for their back-to-back home games, including the next at Ulverstone.

"We get back this week and hopefully will have Stephanie healthy," he said.

"You know we'll get Cassie Jordan back in the next couple of games and we'll get Ali Partridge back too.

"But we've just had players in and out all of this year."

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