The Bears, which lost to Mt Xavier on Saturday, are now just teetering inside the division one weekend pennant bowls top four.

Central Wendouree picked up just three points from the encounter, which Mt Xavier won 97-86 away from home.

Chis McDonald’s rink had the biggest say in the result, winning by 22 shots.

The Bears are only a solitary point clear in fourth spot, just ahead of Buninyong, which they face in the coming weeks.

Saturday’s result is also a massive one for Mt Xavier, which has boosted its late bid for finals.

The side has closed the gap on fourth-placed Central Wendouree to just 10 points and will fancy its chances of climbing into the finals bracket with three of the last four home and away games against teams outside the top four.

Elsewhere in the Ballarat District Bowls Division’s elite league on Saturday, Creswick landed victory over the ladder-leaders.

The Wickers claimed a seven-shot win at home to Ballarat East, which has kept its place at the summit despite the result.

Creswick is sixth and just seven points adrift of fourth spot.

Also on Saturday afternoon, there was a tie between Ballarat and Buninyong.

The two teams were locked together on 93 shots apiece at the end of 100 ends and also shared the rinks to both take an even split of nine points from the contest.

Other winners in round 14 were Learmonth and Webbcona.

In the Geelong-Ballarat Premier Bowls league, it was Queenscliff that inflicted defeat on top team Bareena to trim its lead out in front.

The Cliffers were away from home, but proved too good, winning by 15 shots.

Meanwhile, City of Geelong broke through for its first success of the 2017-18 campaign after beating BMS by 11 shots, Lara defeated Eastern Park, Sebastopol got home against Webbcona and Victoria scored a nice win against the powerful Ocean Grove.