Now the focus for co-coaches Natalie Avellino and Janine Southby, and the players, has to be on repairing them.
The Steel lost all five of its matches, following Friday's losses to the Magic (40-30) and the Firebirds (53-36) with Saturday losses to the Fever (40-31) and the Swifts (45-34), before wrapping the weekend with a 49-42 loss to the Tactix yesterday.
While the results were disappointing, captain Jodi Brown said the three-day tournament had proved valuable from a development perspective.
"It's really highlighted the areas we need to work on, which is great, because if we came out of this unsure of what we needed to do, there would be no point us being here," Brown said.
"The losses are not what we want but, barring that last game against the Tactix, collectively we have been getting stronger each game. We just let ourselves down today.
"Our aim was to get better each game and learn from our mistakes, but we're probably not learning fast enough. We're aware of what they are, we're just not acting on them and making the necessary adjustments straight away."
In a game marred by turnovers, the Steel struggled to contain a Tactix side obviously hungrier to chalk up its first victory of the weekend.
Down 13-11 at the end of the first quarter, and 26-21 at halftime, the Ascot Park Hotel-sponsored Steel bounced back, inspired by the injection of veteran shooter Donna Wilkins.
Scrabbling back to within a goal, the Steel dominated the third quarter, with experienced campaigners Phillipa Finch and Demelza McCloud commanding defensively.
A last-minute surge earned the Tactix a 38-34 buffer heading into the final spell and the Steel struggled to regain its momentum.
The superior accuracy of the Tactix on attack was a significant factor, while the bruising presence of defenders Bessie Manu and Anna Galvan made life a battle for the Steel.
"The story of the tournament has been that the defence has got us lots of ball and we've just turned it over on attack," Brown said.
"We can get away with that now, because it's pre-season, but we need to address it and rectify it for the season.
"Overall it has been successful in terms of what we wanted to achieve but there is a lot of work to do in the next few weeks."
With nine new players in the squad, the Steel should at least have gained some benefit from the pre-season games.
Co-coach Natalie Avellino said the team had ticked off its tournament goals.
"Everyone hates losing but the goal for us was to put players on court and see those players grow and improve and we achieved that," Avellino said.
"We weren't too concerned about the results but we were disappointed that we were in some games and let it slip away.
"Overall we just have a quarter where we are getting burned but we have also seen some really exciting things happening out on court."
The Steel's opening game of the ANZ Championship is against the Magic in Invercargill on April 2.
The Queensland Firebirds won the Tauranga tournament, thumping the Melbourne Vixens 50-30 in the final.
The Magic claimed third spot with a 51-36 win over the Mystics.
