The Gators were unable to reel in the visitors following their hot start to the round 13 encounter at Shepparton Sports Stadium and settled for a 74 to 82 defeat.
Keysborough piled on 23 to 17 in the first term and didn’t look back.
The Cougars didn’t let slip of the lead for the entire contest, despite the Gators working overtime to trim the margin.
A poor shooting night didn’t help the hosts’ quest either, with the Gators posting 37 per cent from the field.
Sam Beks led the scoring with 16 points and was one of the Gators’ best performers.
Beks backed up his efforts on the offensive end with seven rebounds and four steals.
Gabe Evans (13 points and seven rebounds) and Jordy Michel (eight rebounds and six assists) both battled away hard and provided quality support.
Despite the loss pushing the Gators to third on the ladder, it wasn’t all negatives for head coach Josh Waight in the wash-up of the clash.
“I was really happy with the endeavour from the group and their ability to fight it out,” he said.
“Gabe and Jordy were both fantastic and Beksy (Sam Beks) played one of his best games of the year.
“Unfortunately we just didn’t shoot the ball as well as we would have liked. We were in the game, got it back to four points but we just couldn’t get it within two or tie the game. To Keysborough’s credit they hit some really big shots.
“They got off to a big start and we had a few too many defensive lapses where we gave them wide-open looks, but we’ll sit down and watch the film and work on getting better.”
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