The NRL has been reduced to eight teams, and the finals are here. Four weeks of glorious rugby league, which will crown the champion for 2021.
It's been another chaotic season with rule changes changing the fabric of the game, and more teams than ever struggling in a big way.
Despite that, we still had a race for the top eight which came down to the final day of the season as the Gold Coast Titans blew the New Zealand Warriors out of the water to knock the Cronulla Sharks out of the competition.
The Canberra Raiders were also in the running in the final round before they lost to the Sydney Roosters, while the Warriors themselves, as well as the St George Illawarra Dragons and Wests Tigers were in realistic contention up until the end of Round 23, and mathematical miracle level contention until Round 24.
The Brisbane Broncos, North Queensland Cowboys and Canterbury Bulldogs also missed the finals.
But what was the moment where their seasons took an irreversible trip to the bottom of the table? This is the moment for your eliminated club which sucked all the life out of the season.
This is a difficult exercise for a team who only won three games all season, but you have to go all the way back to the start to remember there was some - minimal as it might have been - hope around the Bulldogs this season.
They had beaten the Rabbitohs in Round 19 of the 2020 season and went close against all of the Sea Eagles, Titans, Raiders and Warriors in the final six weeks of the season.
Add that to plenty of players playing for their NRL future, and they should have been at the very least competitive against fellow bottom sides.
Losses to start the season against the Knights and Panthers might have been expected, but being held scoreless by the Broncos 24-0 in Round 3 wasn't.
It was an embarrassing performance from Trent Barrett's side, and one which would set the tone as they lost 38-0 to the Rabbitohs, 52-18 to the Storm and 30-18 to the Cowboys in the following weeks before finally recording their first win in Round 7 over the Sharks.
Not that it mattered - the season was gone.
Up to the midway point of the season, the Cowboys had won six of their last eight to move into the top eight. While their form away from Townsville was abysmal, there was a feeling Todd Payten was starting to get his team humming in the right direction.
At any rate, the men from Townsville should have been in contention for the finals.
But then they ran into the Tom Trbojevic-less Sea Eagles on the back of State of Origin 1.
Their woeful form on the road for the first half of the season didn't seem to bother them as they shot out to a 12-0 lead in the first eight minutes. It looked like they were going to run away with it and continue building a case for their own inclusion as a finals candidate.
But instead, they clocked off, checked out and conceded nine back-to-back tries as Manly eventually posted a 50-18 victory.
While the Sea Eagles then continued to fly, the Cowboys would go on to lose ten matches on the trot until they finally beat the Dragons in Round 24.
An embarrassing performance which put the wheels in motion for a pathetic second half of the season.
The Broncos may have only won two from their first eight, but a perceived easier run ahead with games against the Cowboys, Sea Eagles, Dragons and Raiders in the six weeks that followed could have been the moment for Kevin Walters' side to turn things around.
That was particularly true with so many players off-contract and looking to prove a point.
But turn things around they simply didn't. Instead, they squandered an 18-12 lead over the Cowboys in Round 9, losing 19-18 as Valentine Holmes sunk a field goal in a Queensland derby which, while close, won't go down as an epic.
Jason Taumalolo's 74th minute try proved exactly what a soft underbelly the Broncos had, while Holmes kicking the field goal was a dagger proving exactly where the Broncos were at in the experience stakes.
The Broncos then had 50 put on them by the Sea Eagles, and while they beat the Roosters a week later as Victor Radley found the sin bin twice in the same game, conceding 50 to the Dragons in Round 13 proved exactly where they were at.
There are a lot of moments you could look at for the Tigers and identify as the one which killed their chances. Maybe it was letting in 66 to the Storm? Or 40 and 38 to the Eels and Rabbitohs on either side of that. Or going back even further, a horrid Round 9 loss to the Titans.
But no, of all the tales from tiger town this year, it's impossible to go past the Round 20 two-point loss to the New Zealand Warriors.
This is a team who were still in with a shot at the finals, playing a side with quite literally everybody missing. Roger Tuivasa-Sheck and Leeson Ah Mau had gone home, Tohu Harris, Wayde Egan and Addin Fonua-Blake were injured, Matt Lodge was suspended, Euan Aitken played in the second row. The list goes on.
It should have been one-way traffic for the Tigers.
And it was for a little while as they ran out to a 10-0 lead at halftime. But then they must have fallen asleep in the sheds, because Aitken scored an out of position double and Bunty Afoa went right through them to score, putting the Warriors ahead.
In the end, it was only goal kicking which cost the Tigers, but it was a loss which they simply couldn't recover from to keep whatever slim chances they had alive.
For a team who spent so long guttsing it out, playing away from home and with so many out injured or suspended or having gone home, the Round 23 loss to the Broncos was gut-wrenching for the Warriors.
It's not down to any one factor. They just looked a team who were gassed at times, but what makes the loss so painful is they actually scored more tries than the Broncos.
It's two competition points which has potentially cost them a spot in September, but with Reece Walsh only kicking one from five, compared to Herbie Farnworth's four from four, Warriors fans have the right to be asking "What if?"
What if they won that day? Does it change the mindset for the final two rounds against the Canberra Raiders and Gold Coast Titans, and as a result, the final scorelines of those games?
Even one win there could have had them in the finals if they had of gotten the better of the Broncos.
A brave season for the Warriors, and all reports suggest they are going to need to show more of it in 2022, but it doesn't make the loss to the Broncos any less painful.
This isn't going to be an on-field incident. It shouldn't come as a surprise either.
The Dragons were, well, they weren't exactly humming along, but they were certainly in finals contention after a blistering start to the season which included a shock win over the Parramatta Eels.
And then things which had been steadily worsening got a whole lot worse in a hurry. Paul Vaughan's infamous barbecue in the middle of COVID times. Stupid beyond belief.
Vaughan wouldn't play another game for the club, 12 players got suspended and the Dragons went on to lose eight straight to end the season.
It was a shambles - about as bad as you could possibly imagine an incident impacting a team.
The Raiders always knew they had a tough finish to the season and needed to be in a far stronger position than they were in. Games against the Storm, Sea Eagles and Roosters in the last month can hardly be blamed for them missing the finals, especially as they won against the Warriors, which they were expected too.
But you can't help but feel the Raiders should have achieved a lot more this year. They were widely viewed as a top-six candidate and have missed the finals altogether.
For a side that had a very miserable first half of the season though, things had finally started to turnaround until they met the Dragons in Round 15.
The Dragons had been floundering themselves and found themselves down 20 points to 8 not long after halftime. What transpired next summed up the Raiders' season.
Tries to Gerard Beale, youngster Tyrrel Sloan and Corey Norman in the space of 20 minutes gave the Dragons a two-point lead before they managed to hang onto the game and take the two points.
The next week, the Raiders lost 44 points to 6 against the Titans, which tells you all you need to know.
Much to Sharks' fans disbelief, the moment which ruined their season wasn't the Warriors letting 44 in on Saturday, as much as they'd love to blame someone else for their own shortcomings.
For a team who missed more tackles than any other this season, finishing anywhere near the top eight was actually quite the achievement.
Cronulla had some pretty abysmal losses this season, but after winning two of their first five in an incredibly difficult start to the season (and being very competitive with the Raiders and Roosters), the club baffingly announced John Morris would be departing immediately.
Craig Fitzgibbon coming in was playing the long game without a doubt, but it made no sense to essentially throw away the entire 2021 season five rounds in.
The players responded to Josh Hannay being inserted as the interim coach by losing five straight, the first two of those to the Knights and Bulldogs.
That tells you all you need to know about that situation.