The owners of the New York Mets baseball team on Monday lost their bid to end a $386 million lawsuit brought by the trustee seeking money for victims of Bernard Madoff's fraud.

U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff in New York agreed that the trustee, Irving Picard, should be able to recover fictitious profits that Mets owners Fred Wilpon and Saul Katz got in the two years prior to the bankruptcy of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC. The Mets owners were long-time investors with Madoff.

Rakoff nonetheless said he remained skeptical that the trustee would be able to show the Mets owners acted in bad faith in their dealings with Madoff. A trial is scheduled to begin March 19.

(Reporting By Jonathan Stempel; editing by Mark Porter)