This year alone, plenty thought the Tiger Lillies, headlined by Milton-Ulladulla's Olivia Patterson, Keele Browne and Meg Buchanan, Stingrays' Riley Scott and Teagan Berry, Berry-Shoalhaven Heads' Josie Strong and Albion Park-Oak Flats' Brittany Constable, would be merely making up the numbers in their first season in the NSW Women's Premiership.

It was something they did entirely off their own bat, no leagues club backing, no NRL club affiliation, the only club running around in the competition without one or both.

They had a bye, a washout and faced the defending premiers Mounties in the opening three rounds. The subsequent two games came on the road on freezing Monday nights.

If a debut season was going to bottom out, it would've. Instead, they ground out wins, the only two in their first six games. Then they put together a five-game winning streak to finish the regular season.

The last win at Rex Jackson Oval came after trailing 14-4 at half-time, only to win 16-14 and climb into fourth spot. It proved telling when the six-team finals series was shrunk to four as COVID lockdown first hit Greater Sydney - including Wollongong.

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It set up a grand final qualifier against undefeated minor premiers Central Coast Roosters. It gave them their puncher's chance but, as we've constantly been reminded, nothing packs a bigger punch than this damn pandemic.

It intervened, as it has with infuriating regularity, and saw the competition pushed back another week and a four-team finals series abandoned. In the end, lockdown extension looks to have put paid to the grand final between the Roosters and Mounties.

There's no denying they were huge underdogs against the Roosters, but speak to coach Ryan Powell, and there's little doubt his side had an upset in it.

"I believe there was a way of beating those [Central Coast] girls," Powell said.

"It's no secret we'd have needed to be on to beat them but, come finals day, stranger things have happened. All we needed was a chance. That got taken away so it's a question we'll never know the answer to, but I was going in confident and so were the girls.

"You just feel empty for them. They've worked so hard since the end of November last year and they've come so far. It's a new team, everything's been off scratch, so it's been tough along the way and they've had to work hard.

"To the get [finals] pulled out from under your feet, it leaves you pretty empty and left wondering. But what can you do, it's the way of the world at the moment."

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It obviously poses questions about next year and the chance at a do-over.

"It wasn't a one-hit wonder situation, we were here to make a dent in the competition this year," Powell said.

"That itch isn't going to go away when it gets pulled out from under your feet like it has been. You're going to come back hungrier."

A finals tilt would have been a fitting reward for a club that fielded five senior sides last year amid COVID chaos; the only club in the Illawarra to do so. It's paid a price too, though one hopes its moving toward a first-grade (men's) return next season - the comp just doesn't feel right without the Tiger Lillies.

It goes some way to explaining the visceral reactions to NRL players' inability to follow simple protocols in order to keep the competition - and their bank accounts - ticking over.

After all their hard work, COVID's denied these Tiger Lillies' women the chance to enjoy the fruits of their sacrifices in the form of a finals appearance. Their NRL counterparts can't not have house parties, or not invite 'dancers' into Origin camp.

It's not to minimise difficulties NRL players face in constantly shifting COVID sands. Your columnist only brings it up in the in order to bring some perspective.

As far Powell's perspective on his team's effort this season, it's far from cloudy.

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"They're champions," he says.

"It was a side that came together, it was a late inclusion into the competition. It was 'put your hand up if you want to play and if you want to play you're in'. They were playing against teams that have been together four-five years.

"Some of our girls didn't know each other, hadn't spoken to each other, hadn't heard of each other before, and they were able to come together and blow some of those sides off the park.

"It says a lot about their drive as a team and as individuals, and says a lot for their football ability, to be able to come together as a team like that and achieve such good things.

"Who knows where it was going to finish, but what they achieved in a year of just throwing a team together I think is unbelievable. I class them as a team of champions. Absolutely."