It says much about the lofty standards the Storm have set during Craig Bellamy’s remarkable reign that their top-four finish is viewed as a grand final missed rather than a preliminary final made.
In eight of the past nine seasons, the purple army has marched into week three of the finals, progressing to the grand final four times and winning the premiership twice in 2017 and 2020.
After the indignation of being knocked out by the Raiders in an elimination final in 2022, Bellamy’s men headed into the new season with a vastly different squad after the departure of Jesse and Kenny Bromwich, Felise Kaufusi and Brandon Smith.
All premiership players, all fan favourites, all donning different jerseys in 2023 as the Storm moved into a new era.
The fab four forwards ripped 791 games of experience out of the Storm stable but it took them just one game to remind the NRL they had no intention of dropping off.
On opening night back in March they came up against 2022 grand finalists Parramatta on their own patch and escaped with a 16-12 win courtesy of a Harry Grant try in golden point.
Grant steals it in Golden Point
Across the next seven weeks the Storm endured a wild ride that included classy wins over the Rabbitohs, Rooster and Warriors, and clumsy losses to the Bulldogs and Titans.
Slumping as low as 13th after Round 3 and rising as high as third after Round 6, Melbourne could take heart from the fact they won two games without star playmaker Jahrome Hughes, who was suspended for Dangerous Contact on Titan Tanah Boyd.
After struggling for consistency in the first half of the season, Melbourne set sail for the finals with a 54-10 mauling of the Sharks in Round 15 and were never out of the top four from that point onwards.
Not only did the Storm show their class on the field but Bellamy and captain Christian Welch oozed class in the post-match media conference when they endorsed their former teammate Nicho Hynes for NSW Blues selection in Game 2 despite the lopsided scoreline against his Sharks.
Tellingly in light of how the rest of the season would unfold Bellamy also noted that the Storm needed to learn from what worked from them day and what hadn’t worked in other matches.
“Hopefully we can take the learnings from today and bring it in to every game we’ve got left,” Bellamy said.
Ensuing wins over the Roosters, Eels and Raiders gave hope for September but a pair of losses to premiers Penrith in Round 18 and 23 by a combined scoreline of 60-22 had alarm bells ringing.
NRL try time: Xavier Coates
When the finals did roll around, a demoralising loss to the Broncos followed by a courageous win over the Roosters set up a third meeting with the Panthers and that’s where the dream was shattered with their biggest defeat of the season.
“We shot ourselves in the foot, in fact we blew our foot off,” Belllamy lamented in the wake of the 38-4 loss.
“Our game tonight was a small example of what we have been dishing up all year – up and down, up and down, inconsistent.
“If we didn’t know that before tonight we learned a good lesson tonight.
"Penrith are so consistent at doing their own job and that’s what makes them so good but we just seemed to go up and down, sometimes good and sometimes not so good. That’s what we need to learn to do.
“It’s no use kicking stones, we need to learn from tonight and work hard in the pre-season and come back and see what happens.
Panthers v Storm – Finals Week 3, 2023
“It took us a while to know what our best footy was after a change of personnel in the off-season.”
Not an excuse but a very plausible explanation when you consider the Bromwich brothers and Kaufusi had been a barometer of the standards Bellamy demands and Smith had provided the perfect 1-2 punch at hooker with Grant.
The other massive loss for the Storm in 2023 was dynamic fullback Ryan Papenhuyzen, who endured a long and painful rehabilitation from a shattered kneecap but looked set to provide much needed X-factor off the bench during the finals.
Some 384 days after suffering the injury against the Raiders late in the 2022 season, Papenhuyzen made it back for the Sunshine Coast Falcons in August before making a triumphant return to the NRL in the 37-16 win over the Titans in Round 26.
After getting through 77 minutes the following week against the Broncos he was ready for a crack at finals footy but cruelly injured his ankle in the qualifying final at Suncorp Stadium and was taken from the field on a medicab as the league community collectively held its breath.
Papenhuyzen suffered a dislocated ankle, broken fibula, ruptured medial ligament and ruptured syndesmosis but hopes to be back training in the new year.
"We're obviously devastated for Ryan suffering another setback after spending a significant time away from the game after injuring his knee last year," Storm general manager Frank Ponissi said.
Ryan Papenhuyzen: The return
"He's worked extremely hard to get back to the NRL over that time and left no stone unturned in his recovery.
"We know that he is the ultimate professional on and off the field and this is just another challenge that he will take on with both hands."
Because that's the Melbourne Storm way. And the reason a preliminary final is seen as a grand final missed.