It was the harshest of lessons and one that could cost GWS a top four spot, but veteran Giants midfielder Ryan Griffen says his youthful teammates will be stronger for having endured Saturday night's last-second defeat to West Coast.
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Nic Naitanui's goal from the game's final stoppage, a throw deep in the GWS defensive end with eight seconds on the clock, was dealt with during a lengthy review session at club headquarters on Monday afternoon.
Griffen knew there wasn't much time remaining in the contest, but admits he didn't know exactly there was only eight seconds until the final siren.
He was locking down on West Coast midfield gun Matthew Priddis at the time, about 10m away from the fall of the ball, which Naitanui roved after a Shane Mumford tap down.
Naitanui beat Dylan Shiel to the footy and hurriedly threw it onto his left boot, stealing a victory GWS looked to have sewn up when Rory Lobb kicked a major with just 77 seconds left on the clock.
"Things just happen so quickly during an AFL game, you've just got to keep your head and try and figure out the situation and on the weekend we sort of let ourselves down in that area," Griffen said.
"There's situations like that all through the game, contest after contest.
"Dylan gets in hard and has a crack. You lose contests and you win contests and Nic Nat [Naitanui], he won that contest.
"There were a few structure issues but guys learn from that and that's why you review a game.
"We'll take a fair bit away from that situation, the last minute and a half what we could've done better. Hopefully we're bigger and better for it."
The Giants now turn their attention to third-from-bottom Fremantle who they entertain at Spotless Stadium this weekend in another Saturday twilight game.
GWS could be without defender Adam Kennedy, who suffered concussion in the loss to West Coast when on the wrong end of a sling tackle by Simon Tunbridge.
The Eagle hard man has been offered a two-match suspension by the AFL's Match Review Panel, and a further week for a separate striking incident on Kennedy earlier in the game.
Play was stopped for five minutes after the tackle, with Kennedy having to be stretchered from the field.
The 24-year-old returned to the bench to watch the closing stages of the game, but continues to be closely monitored by the club's medical staff.
Griffen meanwhile suffered a suspected broken nose against West Coast but played on, albeit with an abundance of facial taping rendering his nasal airways almost useless.
Despite the injury, he's still expected to line up against Fremantle.
"The blood just wouldn't stop, they needed to do something, I don't know if the taping was great, it was hard to breathe," Griffen said.
"You just have to make sure you keep your nose out of the way of elbows.
"The most important thing for us is Fremantle this week, get the mood back up for the guys.
"They're still a quality outfit, they've still got quality players.
"They play a hard brand of footy, we're going to have to be on our game."
Fremantle heads to Sydney after a tumultuous week which threw up speculation about the futures of Hayden Ballantyne and Nat Fyfe, and ended in a 72-point drubbing at the hands of Adelaide.
