Negotiations broke off between NBA players and club owners late Tuesday with all 114 pre-season games wiped out, no new talks planned and the threat of regular-season games to be lost on Monday.

Bargaining committees met for more than four hours in a failed last-ditch bid to solve a shutdown over financial issues that has lasted for 96 days, since owners locked out players after a prior deal ended July 1.

“By Monday we will have no choice but to cancel the first two weeks of the season,” NBA commissioner David Stern said.

“We were not able to make the progress we would have liked to make.”

NBA owners had previously called off pre-season training camps and wiped out 43 pre-season games through October 15. With Tuesday bringing two more lost weeks of exhibitions, Stern estimated the NBA has already lost $200 million.

Billy Hunter, executive director of the NBA players association, said talks might not resume for a month or two. If true, it would likely mean no NBA games until next year at the earliest, he said.

“We have nothing scheduled (but) we have no foregone conclusions,” Stern said.

What will be gone by Monday, if Stern makes good on his threat and talks do not make a surprise resumption, are the first two weeks of the NBA season, the first games lost to a financial dispute since the 1998-99 NBA season.

Scheduled opening night games include Oklahoma City at the Lakers, Houston at Utah and Chicago at reigning NBA champions Dallas.

Owners want a hard salary cap rather than the current exemption-filled system and a greater share of revenues from what last season was a $3.8 billion business.

They claim losses of $300 million last season, saying only eight of 30 teams made a profit.

Stern said owners backed off a firm salary cap but players have seen such moves as only finding a different way of imposing salary limitations.