During the first 10 minutes, a call went through the Arrowtown backline: "Christmas."
Supporters among the small, but loud, Arrowtown crew were heard to say "They just called Christmas.
Do they think it's come early?
"Seventy minutes later it had and the emotion after the final whistle blew was overwhelming.
As the 22 muddied, bloodied and exhausted Arrowtown men jumped for joy and hugged each other, the smiles on their faces said it all.
One player summed it up with one word: "Ecstasy."
It's been a season the "A-Men" and their supporters will not forget, having lost just one game of 16 played this year.
Last weekend, the team walked off the field in Wanaka victorious, with the Central Otago Premier Championship cup held high and a trophy cabinet to put up in their clubrooms to hold it.
That trophy cabinet will now need to be re-sized to accommodate the wooden shield the team held aloft on Saturday afternoon.
For coach Richie Anderson, yesterday morning was surreal, he said.
"I rang up one of the boys and said, `It wasn't a dream, was it?'"I'm pretty happy."
While Anderson said he was feeling a little nervous in the first 10 minutes of the game, when it seemed Lawrence had control, he soon realised the opposition appeared to be playing without a game plan.
"They were kicking and it was working for them for a while, but their kicker was having a nightmare with the boot.
As far as I could see, pick and go was going to win us the game."
A massive Fijian winger playing for Lawrence looked to be the biggest problem for Arrowtown, until Anderson decided to swap wingers, putting Jodi Hampton against him.
"Jodi tackles like a demon and just took care of him - Finchy [fullback Hayden Finch] ended up saying, `Jodi, you tackle the big fella and I'll take care of everything else'."
ANDERSON said the dying seconds of the game - there was no clock to see how long was left to play - was "just the best".
"It was a line-out and it went to the mailman [Jim O'Malley].
The ball came down and ... was kicked out.
What a feeling.
To see grown men hug..
What a buzz, especially when all the papers had written us off."
While expectations might be high for the A-Men next year, that wasn't a bad thing, he said.
"No-one's going to look at Arrowtown and say `easy beats' again.
That tag is gone.
We did it once and we will do it again."
However, if Arrowtown manages to repeat its success next year, it will be without Anderson as coach.
He is stepping down from the role to spend more time with his young family, although he'll still dabble in coaching - focusing on his 9-year-old son's rugby team.
Eight members of the Arrowtown Premiers have been named in Otago Country teams to represent the area in a tournament between Southland Country and Canterbury Country: Aidan Winter, Daniel Iosefo, Jason Rapana and Daniel Dodds have been named in the Otago Country team; Reece Winter, Greg McDonald, Luke Mullen and Richard Andrew in the Otago Country Development side.
