Campaign for the ages
Te Maire magic
Chanel’s landmark field goal
Taine’s historic hat-trick
Season stats leaders
Wahs-Phins rivlary hits big stage
Warriors out to reverse week one trend
The Warriors eked a nail-biting 31-30 win over Manly, fighting back late to maintain their perfect 2026 record of winning every game they led at halftime.
But the overall game stats did not reflect a game that went down to the wire.
The Warriors enjoyed 60 percent possession, completed at 80 percent to the Sea Eagles’ 67 percent, and ran for almost 500 more run metres and doubled the visitors’ post-contact metres total.
The Warriors also won the penalty count (7-5) and set restart count (7-1).
It will surprise few who watched the game, though, that Manly turned its scant possession into nine line-breaks to the Warriors’ six, while the Sea Eagles also had a better average set distance (41.09 metres to 38.93).
A campaign for the ages
The Warriors’ victory was their 18th — eclipsing the club record of 17 regular-season wins set in 2002.
The team had already broken the 2002 team’s mark for most points in a regular season, extending it to 728 (30.33 points per game) as the Warriors finished as the top attacking side for the first time ever.
Conceding a glut of points over the last few rounds saw them miss out on the best defensive record in Warriors history, but their tally of 418 points conceded (17.42 per game) was behind on the 2011 combination’s 393 points.
Meanwhile, the Warriors’ late-season pointscoring spree saw them score over 30 points in four straight games for just the second time — after the 1999 side’s run during the first four rounds of that campaign.
Magic Martin
After a month on the sidelines — and with a section of the fanbase still pushing for Luke Metcalf’s return in the No.7 should he become available again during the finals — Te Maire Martin returned with a ball-playing masterclass.
Martin produced three try assists and threw the second-last pass for the Warriors other three tries, as well as making 16 runs for 115 metres.
The somewhat unlikely linchpin saviour boasts 12 try assists and 12 line-break assists in 11 appearances in 2026 and has scored six tries, all while averaging 90 running metres and 22 tackles per game.
The veteran utility’s highest try assist tally in a season came in 2024, when he delivered 16 in 16 games. One more four-pointer will give him a career-best total in that department.
Chanel slots one to join rare club
Just in time for some high-stakes, pressure-cooker footy at Go Media Stadium, Harris-Tavita became the only Warriors player besides Shaun Johnson to kick a field goal at the ground in the past 14 years.
Meanwhile, CHT's second NRL career one-pointer — and first since Round 1, 2021 — saw him become only the fifth player to kick multiple field goals for the Warriors, and he's set a new record for the longest gap between kicking field goals for the club.
BONUS FACT: Johnson, Luke Metcalf and now Harris-Tavita are the only Warriors players to kick a deadlock-breaking field goal to win a game since 2009.
MOST FIELD GOALS FOR WARRIORS
17 — Shaun Johnson
14 — Stacey Jones
7 — James Maloney
3 — Gene Ngamu
2 — Chanel Harris-Tavita
Taine’s historic treble
After getting a starting line-up reprieve via Leka Halasima’s withdrawal, Taine Tuaupiki grabbed his opportunity with an unforgettable try-saving tackle, three tries — including a superb solo equaliser — and team-high tallies of eight tackle-breaks and 168 metres from 15 runs.
Tuaupiki’s hat-trick was the first by a Warriors fullback in almost 30 years; Marc Ellis’ treble in a 50-22 win over North Queensland in 1997 — also in a final-round clash at Mount Smart — was the most recent.
Phil Blake still holds the record for most tries in a match by a Warriors custodian, crossing four times in the club’s fourth match (and first win, though the competition points were stripped for fielding an illegal replacement), a 46-12 victory over Western Suburbs in Auckland in 1995.
It was the first time Tuaupiki has scored more than one try in an NRL game, having crossed only six times previously in 44 top-grade appearances.
Season stats leaders
It’s the end of the regular season, so let’s see where the Warriors stats leaders finished up NRL-wise.
MOST TRIES: 20 — Dallin Watene-Zelezniak (equal-fifth in the NRL)
MOST POINTS: 92 — Tanah Boyd (22nd in the NRL)
MOST LINE-BREAKS: 19 — Dallin Watene-Zelezniak (equal-12th in the NRL); 18 — Alofiana Khan-Pereira (equal-15th in the NRL)
MOST TACKLE-BREAKS: 99 — Taine Tuaupiki (12th in the NRL); 77 — Leka Halasima (equal-31st in the NRL)
AVERAGE TACKLE-BREAKS: 5.0 — Taine Tuaupiki (equal-13th in the NRL); 3.9 — Leka Halasima (equal-46th in the NRL)
MOST RUN METRES: 3,364 — Taine Tuaupiki (28th in the NRL); 3,244 — Erin Clark (33rd in the NRL)
AVERAGE RUN METRES: 168.2 — Taine Tuaupiki (26th in the NRL); 161.1 — Jackson Ford (40th in the NRL)
MOST POST-CONTACT METRES: 1,194 — Erin Clark (24th in the NRL); 1,083 — James Fisher-Harris (37th in the NRL)
AVERAGE POST-CONTACT METRES: 66.8 — Jackson Ford (5th in the NRL); 59.8 — Mitch Barnett (18th in the NRL)
MOST TRY ASSISTS: 14 — Chanel Harris-Tavita (equal-18th in the NRL); 12 — Te Maire Martin and Wayde Egan (equal-26th in the NRL)
MOST OFFLOADS: 24 — Erin Clark (equal 31st in the NRL)
MOST RECEIPTS: 2,251 — Wayde Egan (4th in the NRL); 908 — Chanel Harris-Tavita (40th in the NRL)
MOST RUNS: 354 — Erin Clark and Taine Tuaupiki (equal-24th in the NRL)
MOST DUMMY-HALF RUNS: 106 — Wayde Egan (2nd in the NRL); 65 — Sam Healey (6th in the NRL)
MOST TACKLES: 697 — Wayde Egan (41st in the NRL)
AVERAGE TACKLES: 41.1 — Jackson Ford (8th in the NRL)
MOST MISSED TACKLES: 69 — Jacob Laban (equal-19th in the NRL); 60 — Leka Halasima (equal-43rd in the NRL)
MOST ERRORS: 29 — Dallin Watene-Zelezniak (equal-18th in the NRL); 24 — Jacob Laban (equal-39th in the NRL)
MOST PENALTIES: 11 — Leka Halasima (equal-21st in the NRL); 10 — Ali Leiataua (equal-30th in the NRL)
MOST RUCK INFRINGEMENTS: 12 — James Fisher-Harris (5th in the NRL); 9 — Kurt Capewell (equal-12th in the NRL)
MOST SET RESTARTS (INSIDE THE 10): 3 — Mitch Barnett (equal-21st in the NRL)
MOST DECOY RUNS: 157 — Jackson Ford (equal-39th in the NRL); 156 — Tanner Stowers-Smith (equal-42nd in the NRL)
MOST TIMES PLAYER IN SUPPORT: 145 — Jacob Laban (equal-13th in the NRL); 144 — Chanel Harris-Tavita (equal-15th in the NRL)
Tight Phins rivaly hits big stage
The Warriors and Dolphins have split their eight encounters four wins apiece, with neither side managing more than one victory in a row. If that pattern is to continue, it’s the Warriors’ turn this weekend.
Since a blowout home win each during the Dolphins’ maiden 2023 campaign, the clubs have played a succession of thrillers. None of the subsequent six encounters featured a margin of more than four points — with the past three all decided by two points.
The Warriors fought back from 18-6 down to win 20-18 in Wellington on Anzac Day this year, while they staged another rally to take a late lead in Brisbane two months later — only for the Dolphins to snatch a 26-24 victory with a try in the dying minutes.
The ledger is 2-1 in the Warriors’ favour at Go Media Stadium, but the Dolphins won last season’s barnburner 20-18 with a Jamayne Isaako try on the bell.
Dolphins trio Isaako, Isaiya Katoa and Connelly Lemuelu are the only players to line up in all eight of the clubs’ fixtures. Isaako holds rivalry records for more tries (9) and points (82). Both scoring seven tries in Dolphins-Warriors games, Herbie Farnworth (six games) and Dallin Watene-Zelezniak (seven games) are the only other players with more than two tries in the rivalry.
The Warriors are ranked first in the NRL in attack (30.33 points per game) and second defensively (17.41), while the Dolphins are fifth (27.58) and fourth (21.08), respectively.
Warriors out to reverse week one trend
The Dolphins are on finals debut, while the Warriors head into their 11th post-season campaign.
The Warriors are striving for a victory in week one for the first time in 18 years, having pieced together a modest 3-7 record in the opening round of the playoffs.
Their wins came in a home qualifying final over the eighth-placed Raiders as minor premiers in 2002 (36-20); a stunning beatdown of the third-placed Bulldogs in Sydney in 2003 after finishing sixth (48-22); and an iconic, history-making boilover against minor premiers the Storm as the eighth-placed team in 2008 (18-15).
The Warriors have gone down in all five week one fixtures since — each by a margin of 12-plus points.