With the Steel leading 51-38, the Tactix went on a nine-goal unanswered run and almost staged a dramatic come-from-behind victory in front of 2670 fans at the Lion Foundation Arena in Dunedin last night.
The Steel won the ANZ Championship match 52-48 but an animated Broughton told the gathered media she was disappointed with the officiating.
During an injury break, Steel defender Katrina Grant, who had been feeling ill all match, came off unexpectedly, leaving the Steel camp fumbling with bibs.
The team took longer than the 30 seconds allowed and was penalised with the ball given back to Canterbury.
"We delayed play while we were putting the bibs on . . . but from then on it was a complete shambles," Broughton said.
"I wouldn't have known what any of the rulings were. I'm quite dazed with it."
Silver Ferns captain Adine Wilson was also at a loss to explain the umpiring.
"I'm sure there is a full moon," she joked.
"I was just in a daze too."
With the rulings going against the home team the rest of the game started to unravel as the Tactix went on a march and pruned the gap to just four goals.
"We were lucky we had such a big margin, because we could have really paid for that. I think it will be a really good learning curve for us," Wilson said.
The game was a tale of two goal shooters with Daneka Wipiiti provided an armchair ride up front, while Jodi Brown had to settle for scraps with the Steel cutting off her supply of ball.
Wipiiti set the tone when she drilled the game's first goal from deep and went on to land 39 of her 43 attempts.
Donna Wilkins also proved a good ally with 13 from 17 but, more importantly, some of her passing was top-notch.
With first-choice goal keep Megan Hutton losing the battle with her Achilles injury, Katrina Grant, Sheryl Scanlan and Erika Burgess stepped up on defence.
The trio suffocated the Tactix's ball and forced Brown to play deep in the court.
Bowden found Brown with two superb passes from close to halfway, but her side trailed 16-11 at the break.
Tactix coach Helen Mahon-Stroud rang the changes with Larrissa Willcox coming on at wing defence, Seymour moving to centre and Anna Thompson replacing Angela Mitchell at goal attack.
The changes took some time to settle in with the Steel scoring the first four goals and stretching its lead to nine.
The Tactix did a much better job of getting the ball into Brown's hands in the second half, the former Silver Fern landing 32 of her 36 attempts.
Aside from the ending, Broughton said her side played "exceptionally well" and would take some confidence into the match against the Vixens in Melbourne on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the Otago development team had a weekend of contrasting fortunes in the Lois Muir Challenge.
The defending champion had a 58-43 win over Western on Saturday but turned in a below-par performance against Canterbury yesterday afternoon and was upset 46-40.
Otago coach Janine Southby blamed her side's inability to back up on inexperience.
It was a weekend of two halves," Southby said.
"They just had no spark out there [on Sunday]. They just didn't handle the physical nature of the match and showed some inexperience."
With the undefeated Southland winning both its matches, the loss has likely ended Otago's hopes of retaining the trophy.
Steel 52 (Daneka Wipiiti 39 from 43, Donna Wilkins 13/17)
Tactix 48 (Jodi Brown 32/36, Angela Mitchell 4/7, Anna Thompson 12/16).
Quarter 16-11, half-time 28-21, third quarter 42-35.
