STOKE suffered a late collapse as they went down to a 39-51 defeat at Mildenhall on Saturday.
The A.R.Richards Ltd Potters were strongly in contention for much of the evening at West Row, but ended with nothing to show for their efforts.
Home star Dan Halsey raced to an imperious 18-point maximum, and he received sufficient back-up from Connor Coles in the closing stages as the Potters just missed out on a league point.
The Loomer Road side gave a solid display and led for the first four races before conceding a 5-1 in Heat 5 when Ben Wilson, who had won the opening race, suffered a retirement.
The margin was maintained at two points until Coles pulled off a fine ride to go past both Lee Geary and Ben Hopwood in Heat 9, which put the Fen Tigers six points ahead.
But Stoke hit back immediately with an excellent 5-1 from Tony Atkin and Danny Phillips in the next, putting them into the last five races trailing narrowly, 29-31.
Mildenhall, though, edged a series of 4-2s with Halsey overhauling Wilson on the run to the line in Heat 11, and Atkin suffering a rare fall in the next.
With two races remaining the gap was up to eight points, before Danny Phillips won Heat 14 to leave the Potters in with a chance of taking a league point.
But Phillips and Hopwood were unable to make an impression on Halsey and Coles in the final race, as the Fen Tigers finished with a 5-1.
Stoke boss Malcolm Vasey said: “I don’t feel the final result tells the full story of the meeting, certainly we were very much in touch all evening and to go down by 12 points is harsh in the end.
“Credit to Dan Halsey because an 18-point maximum is a fine achievement at any level but I do think our performance merited at least a league point, and it’s a shame we missed out.
“We have some big home matches still to come and I hope we can take the positives from this meeting to finish as high as possible in the league table.”
MILDENHALL 51: Dan Halsey 18, Connor Coles 11+3, Alfie Bowtell 8+2, Sam Bebee 7+1, Jon Armstrong 6, Joe Lawlor 1, Kyle Hughes r/r. STOKE 39: Danny Phillips 9+2, Ben Hopwood 9, Ben Wilson 7, Tony Atkin 6+1, Lee Geary 5+1, Paul Burnett 3+1, Shaun Tedham r/r.