The Suns started their rebuild when half their roster were just kids

Gold Coast finished on the bottom of the AFLW ladder in 2025.

It was the first season under new head coach Rhyce Shaw and it could have seemed like a terrible place for him to start.

The club was giving up the most points per game in history, 64.3, and losing by a record 37.8 points across the course of the season.

But this was all by design, for the Suns knew exactly what sort of talent was going to land on their doorstep via the draft in December, with a third of the list transformed in just one night.

So, the shift in game plan started before they even arrived, fast-tracking their impact in a big way.

The shift bore some startlingly poor results, but it was all for the greater good of propelling the Suns to their third-ever finals series just 12 months later.

Moving away from the contest

For the bulk of their time in the AFLW, the Suns have been synonymous with hard, contested footy, rolling mauls and dour games. Picture Charlie Rowbottom with ball in hand with three players hanging off her.

It bore low-scoring, scrappy affairs where the side relied on resetting games by creating repeat stoppages.

For this reason, the average score the Suns were conceding from turnover in 2024, their last season under Cam Joyce, seemed reasonable at 27.2 points per game, but they were also giving up nearly four goals per game from stoppage.

Essentially, by minimising the opposition's chance to score from live play, they created more opportunities for teams to get busy out of stoppage.

In an effort to shift away from a stoppage-heavy, contested game style, Shaw needed to be willing to go backwards on the scoreboard to benefit in the long run.

They moved to a more controlled game style in 2025, to varying effect on the given day, and focused more on a kick-mark game and valued uncontested possession.

Teaching those who were going to be around for the long haul how to effectively move from inside the contest to outside transition was always going to be crucial when integrating the likes of Sunny Lappin, Mikayla Nurse, Ava Usher and Dekota Baron in 2026.

To get the most out of these star teenagers, existing players needed to know how to best engage them.

But the growing pains of establishing this change meant they were badly hurt when they turned the ball over, giving up an average of 42.1 points from the source throughout 2025. This is what saw their points against balloon out to record numbers.

Throughout that 2025 season, the Suns also gave up 40.7 inside 50s per game, as well as 9.6 marks inside 50, and 23.2 shots on goal, all unwanted club records. But it all came from that desire to be productive in attack themselves.

Their contested possession rate was dropping, their average metres gained were up, and it might have been small flashes of evidence that they were tracking the right way, but Shaw stuck fat because he knew that a host of talented kids were going to take this game plan and run with it.

Learning to score

Although Gold Coast's average score dropped from 28.3 to 26.6 from 2024 to 2025, the side actually kicked scores of 30 or more points five times last year, compared to just three the year prior. So, it was becoming marginally less consistent, but those stronger attacking performances, helped along by the addition of Havana Harris, were popping up more regularly.

There have been six occurrences in AFLW history of a club averaging a losing margin of 30 or more points, but of those six occurrences, the Suns last year averaged the highest score themselves. Another piece of evidence that the focus on attack was in fact working, it was just about improving that movement through the middle of the ground to really get things going their way.

In 2024, just two Suns, Tara Bohanna (nine goals) and Jac Dupuy (eight), kicked five or more goals across the season. Last year, there were three: Harris in her first season (11 goals), Dupuy (seven) and Jamie Stanton (six).

Of those players, just one has played games for the club this year: Harris. Bohanna moved to Carlton for the 2025 season, Dupuy arrived at Hawthorn this year, and Stanton has been unable to break into the side, and has since announced her retirement.

This year, six Suns have kicked five or more goals, while 11 different players have kicked multiple goals. Harris still leads the way with 18, but Usher (11), Anne Hatchard, Alannah Welsh, Lappin (all eight), and Baron (six) have been busy up forward. Harris is the only one who was at the club last year.

But without the clear intention to move into more of a live-play style of footy, which creates greater opportunity to score, it's unlikely these players would have had so many chances to get busy in attack.

Now, Gold Coast is averaging the highest score in its history (49.7 points per game), from the most inside 50s it has ever generated (37.9).

Attacking is the best defence

By way of controlling the ball more effectively once outside of stoppage, and retaining the ball inside 50 once in the zone, Gold Coast's defensive performance has tightened up significantly. The return of classy halfback Daisy D'Arcy and addition of key defender Georja Davies has also contributed to the strengthening line.

This year the Suns are giving up the third fewest inside 50s in the AFLW, and conceding the fifth-fewest points. A far cry from the record-breaking points teams were putting on them last year.

It has been a masterclass in redeveloping a side at speed. Granted, Gold Coast had an advantage very few sides across history have had: the knowledge and understanding of who is going to be added to their list in the coming year.

But it required the bravery for things to get worse before they were going to get better. They survived the worse, and now celebrate the better with a final on the horizon, and a chance of reaching the top four still live depending on results across the last round of the home-and-away season.