They have been here before, in 2007, and stuffed up. They got caught up in the carnival atmosphere of playing the hapless Portugal and equally poor Romania, and weren't helped by the poor performances they encountered from Scotland and Italy.
It felt like the All Blacks were filling in time while waiting the quarter-finals.
They had tight forwards coming off the bench to play in the back row, and they didn't go out of their way to deny the situation was far from ideal.
It's a mistake Steve Hansen - assistant coach eight years ago - has learned from. And it's something the players are equally determined to avoid.
They are determined to keep themselves in a "playoff" frame of mind - to prepare for Georgia and Tonga as if they are deadly Tier One nations.
They steadfastly refused to be anything other than hugely respectful of Namibia. There was no talk of it being a romp and any suggestion it would be was quickly quashed.
The All Blacks can't afford to be anything than clinical and ruthless.
They could get away with being a bit sloppy and still win games, but that mindset will hardly serve them well when they reach the serious business of the knockout rounds.
Essentially then the All Blacks have removed the opposition from their thinking.
The Namibian test and the next two games are all about them setting the standards of performance they want to achieve.
They won't be happy just winning - they want to tidy up their cohesion, find the slickness and pace they feel they will need to have deeper in the tournament and generally build their confidence in their game structures and ability to put them all together.
"Each team has to prepare in its own way," said Hansen yesterday. "One of the things we pride ourselves on is trying to improve our performance from the previous one.
"We put a line in the sand against Argentina, and the group going out (against Namibia) have to change that to a higher performance level.
"Rugby is a funny thing. If you don't play properly you get a hiding."
The All Blacks will draw another line later today after they leave Olympic Park and challenge themselves to go up another gear again when they meet Georgia.
There won't be any let up in their mentality.
They won't begin to entertain the notion that there are two phases to this World Cup: the playoffs and then the knockout rounds.
They have only ever talked about the next game.
Any questions that come about opponents further down the track are dismissed.
It's one game at a time, with a belief that anything else will be detrimental to their progress in terms of building their performance.
It's an entirely different approach to when the world knew the All Blacks would qualify at a canter and the players did, too. Which is why Hansen said several times before his team left for England that the problem in 2007 was that the All Blacks -- red hot favourites -- turned up in France expecting to win.
They weren't hungry enough for it, didn't realise there would be 19 other teams there all with the same desire.
So this year, Georgia and Tonga may well take a pounding but the first inkling they will get of that is when it is happening.
