A win against the All Blacks seemed years away when the Wallabies folded in the first half of the Sydney Bledisloe.
In Brisbane, they were almost unrecognisable to the team that trotted out that night, delivering when the heat was on and subsequently beating the All Blacks for the first time since 2015.
The difference, in the eyes of their biggest rival, is the ability to take the few opportunities that arise in a clash with New Zealand.
"They took their opportunities - we gave them another intercept try and so that was a seven point start this time and they didn't blow any of the opportunities they had," All Blacks coach Steve Hansen said post match.
"They worked hard and put us under pressure as well, which prevented us taking ours."
New Zealand captain Kieran Read echoed those comments.
"Tonight it came down to the opportunities that they took," Read said.
"It was a physical game, it was a game that we let them into with our ill discipline, potentially.
"And they won the territory - they took that moment and from that they scored two or three tries - so really, that was the difference.
"They took theirs and we didn't take ours.
"That shows the sign of a pretty good team and they're doing that at the moment."
Losing is an unusual experience for an All Blacks side that's expected to win every start and while it will be doom and gloom until they right the ship and record their first win on tour, Hansen was realistic when asked about the state of the team.
"There's a few things I can put my finger on but we won't talk about them here, we will talk about them around some video footage as a team," he said.
"That's what the review is about and we will go back, review our game and look at the things we need to work on and we will fix them.
"That's what we have done over the history of our time as a team and we will do it again - the sun will come up tomorrow.
"If your team doesn't click between your forwards and your backs - which we didn't tonight, I think we really struggled - apart from the first lineout where we struck pretty well, we really did struggle.
"Some of that is the ball we are presenting, some of that is the decisions that we are making and some of that is the pressure from Australia.
"There is no point pointing fingers at anybody - we will have a good look at it on the tape and find out exactly what was wrong.
"We will get on and fix that up."
