Those who felt the pre-match gamesmanship was nothing more than a publicity stunt were forced to quickly change their opinions, when the fuse to the powder keg kept spluttering from start to finish.
Only the personal restraint of the players and four yellow cards handed out by referee Dave Rodgers stopped tempers from exploding.
In fact, Crushers coach Rob Hoy agreed the mate-against-mate hype helped to bring his side undone with players concentrating on getting over their opposite number, rather than working toward the construction of a team victory.
It was a factor but now it's out of the way and Breakers have got their bragging rights, both sides can start preparing for our next match (in two weeks) in a normal fashion, he said.
The loss was only the team's second this season and Hoy admitted he saw the writing on the wall very early when handling was poor, and took too long to improve.
What ball we had we kept turning over, he groaned.
Winning co-coach Paul Butcher was surprised how easy his team found the task of getting the lion's share of early possession.
If we'd been rolled by their big fellows it would have stuck in our minds and made us think we were going to cop it, he said.
Getting good phases early and winning a lot of ball at the breakdown was a big factor.
But we broke down sometimes after three phases and I would prefer if the guys step back a bit when that happens, and work again on going forward.
Breakers did find themselves under pressure for much of the second half when Crushers kept them pinned in the quarter and only stout defence stopped a sudden change in the complexion of the game.
COFFS BREAKERS 22 (Mitch Walton 2, Kris Kent, Brendan Robins tries; Ben Wallace conversion) def COFFS CRUSHERS 10 (Joe Dal Pozzo, Craig Landrigan tries).
