{"id":592504,"date":"2026-09-07T02:46:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T02:46:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/592504\/"},"modified":"2026-09-07T02:46:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T02:46:12","slug":"warriors-fall-short-of-minor-premiership-learn-first-finals-opponent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/592504\/","title":{"rendered":"Warriors fall short of minor premiership, learn first finals opponent"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Warriors have fallen just short of what would have been their second-ever minor premiership.<\/p>\n

Going into the 27th and final round of the regular season, the Warriors were clear of the Panthers by just one on points differential.<\/p>\n

After defeating the Sea Eagles 31-30 in Auckland<\/a> to keep their place on top of the NRL ladder, the Panthers were left needing to beat the Tigers by two or more to finish in first.<\/p>\n

They did just that, hammering the 15th-placed Tigers 38-10 in Sydney.<\/p>\n

Penrith ran in seven tries including a hat-trick to Kiwi forward Casey McLean.<\/p>\n

The result sees the Warriors finish in second, on 42 points with 18 wins and six losses.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The Warriors will meet the Dolphins in week one of the finals at Mount Smart at 6.05pm on Saturday night. (Source: Getty)<\/p>\n

However, coach Andrew Webster has maintained his side is chasing a much bigger carrot in 2026.<\/p>\n

“There will be no one prouder if we happen to be minor premiers. It’s a historical trophy and we’d be proud of it but not at the expense of what we need to do,” Webster told media this week<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Warriors will meet the Redcliffe Dolphins in week one of the finals at Mount Smart at 6.05pm on Saturday night.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, the Panthers will host the Roosters on Sunday; the Rabbitohs will play the Knights on Friday; and the Sharks will be home to the Cowboys in Sydney, following the Warriors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Warriors have fallen just short of what would have been their second-ever minor premiership. Going into the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":592505,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,577,69,213,3006],"class_list":["post-592504","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nrl","tag-nz","tag-sports","tag-warriors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592504","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=592504"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/592504\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/592505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=592504"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=592504"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=592504"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}