At the end of Round 10, 2023, North Melbourne sat in 10th spot on the VFLW ladder with four wins next to its name.

With just four rounds left to play, the State of Play podcast had put a line through the Kangaroos’ finals aspirations which raised murmurs among the playing group under then coach Steph Binder.

The Roos would go on to win three of their final four matches to only narrowly playing the finals.

Binder would leave at the end of the season for an AFLW coaching opportunity, with Brett Gourley the man chosen to replace her.

Gourley quickly instilled a fresh belief to a side that had never featured in a VFLW finals campaign.

“I remember the initial messaging to the group being around building belief as I was walking into a team and a program that had never made finals,” Gourley told VFL.com.au

“I knew we had brought in some pretty exciting talent so we were selling a message of hope to begin with. We spoke about how every team in the competition had the same goal as us and that was to win the premiership, so if it wasn’t the goal setting that separated us then it had to be in our actions and what we did.”

It was a mixed bag for the Roos to start 2024, opening the season with consecutive victories only to lose the next four. Sitting second last on the table nearing the halfway mark of the home and away season, premiership success looked a mile off.

But it was the Round 6 loss to Geelong that proved to be the catalyst for change.

“We had what we called our ‘line in the sand meeting’. I sent out a questionnaire to the group about what they all thought we could do to improve, on-field, off-field, connection-wise,” Gourley said.

“I laid it all on the line and presented the data to the playing group. It was raw, honest, open and the catalyst for our turnaround in our season. We had a one-point victory the next week and felt like things were really starting to turn for us.

“The belief was starting to build.”

That belief quickly became tangible. The Roos went on a destructive tear and would lose only one more game to finish the home and away season in fourth spot and qualifying for its first finals series.

Nothing and no-one was stopping the side in the finals.

They accounted for Essendon by 63 points in the elimination final, before knocking off minor premier Williamstown on its home deck by 18 points in the semi final.

Then in a Grand Final for the ages they defeated the Western Bulldogs by 20 points to claim their maiden premiership triumph.

Key forward Nyakoat Dojiok was the finals champion with 10 goals across the three matches, including four in the Grand Final to claim the Lisa Hardeman Medal.

In 2025, North Melbourne would create an alignment with 2024 VFL premiers Werribee, a partnership that has been praised by many.

Premiership captain Jess Jones called it a day after the 2024 Grand Final win and Renee Tierney was the ready-made replacement.

While the core playing group remained tight, Gourley brought in Mat Hyde, North Melbourne’s head of wellbeing, to work with the side.

Before the season kicked off, another heart-to-heart with key focuses for success was laid out in front of the playing group.

“The pre-season was a continued focus on our connection and culture and to work hard to put ourselves in the best position to go back-to-back,” Gourley said.

“I thought we absolutely nailed both of these areas early in 2025. The culture and connection amongst the group was stronger than ever.

“It was beginning to look like the program we had imagined from the start.”

The dominance of the side grew week by week. Losing just two games in the home and away season, it seemed to many pundits a foregone conclusion the minor premiers would go back-to-back.

But an uncharacteristic stumble at home to Collingwood in the qualifying final meant Gourley and the Roos had to go the long way around to reach a second successive Grand Final.

The comfortably accounted for Williamstown and Box Hill across the next fortnight to set up another clash with Collingwood in the premiership decider.

Similar to 12 months earlier, North Melbourne made a fast start to the Grand Final only to be hauled in.

With the game on the line, it was Stella Reid who was the match-winner, with the defender-turned-forward kicking her third goal in the dying minutes to clinch a six-point victory.

“We actually came up with the plan to throw Stella Reid forward prior to the first final loss, but kept that one up our sleeve and knew that we would pull that lever if we had the opportunity to play them again,” Gourley said.

“I’m very happy we did.”

Alana Barba stamped her credentials as a big game player by winning her second Lisa Hardeman Medal as the best player on the ground. Barba had previously won the award when she steered Essendon to premiership glory in 2022.

Having become just the second team in VFLW history to win successive flags, the side that Brett built surely couldn’t get any better.

However, the off-season addition of Gabby Collingwood (Box Hill Hawks), Molly Eastman (Collingwood), Poppy Schaap, Abby Favell (both Geelong), Ellyse Gamble (Essendon), Emily Hurley (Carlton) and Ava Seton (Port Melbourne) has already paid off in spades.

“It was always our vision to make North Melbourne the best possible place it could be and we always had the philosophy of ‘if we build it, they will come,’” Gourley said.

“But the influx of players wanting to come at the end of 2025 and beginning of 2026 was truly overwhelming and reaffirming of the incredible program, culture and team we had built.

“We always wanted the program to be the closest thing to AFLW outside of actually playing AFLW and I feel we achieved that goal.”

Gourley is no longer the coach of the side after accepting a role as senior assistant coach of Richmond’s AFLW program on the eve of the VFLW season. In the interim, North Melbourne AFLW legend Emma Kearney is taking the reins as senior coach.

The change at the helm hasn’t revealed a single chink in North Melbourne Werribee’s armour so far this season.

While they’ve been slow to get going in opening quarters across the first fortnight of the season, the Roos haven’t had a goal kicked against them in the second half of the first two games.

Favell is already putting forward her credentials as a midfielder star alongside Barba and Maddie Di Cosmo.

Collingwood is working alongside Matilda Zander on the wings, and perhaps the biggest surprise of all, Shelby Knoll (six goals) is holding down the key forward pillar while Dojiok is not part of this side.

Prior to Saturday’s Round 3 clash with Darebin, the Kangaroos will unfurl a second premiership flag, with no signs of slowing down.

Gourley believes whoever is afforded the opportunity to take the reins as senior coah will be blessed with a luxury not many in football are afforded, yet still with room to guide the playing group into their own style.

“I feel the new coach coming in will be able to put their own spin on things and leave their own mark and will also be so strongly supported by an incredible playing group and culture that’s been carefully cultivated and worked on over the last couple of years,” he said.

“Whatever the new coach puts into this group they will be repaid many times over. It is a very special group and I cannot wait to continue to cheer them all on this season.”

North Melbourne Werribee will unfurl its 2025 VFLW premiership flag on Saturday against Darebin at Arden Street Oval. The match begins at 2:05pm. You can watch every game of the VFLW season on AFL.com.au and the AFL Live Official App.