After an Australian Netball League campaign of two halves, Tasmanian Magpies coach Elissa Kent has labelled the reigning premiers' finals series a "new ball game".
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Seven wins in the side's opening eight matches have been followed by five losses - all in a row - in their last six.
But Kent predicted the Tasmanians will be primed for the occasion at the weekend.
"Finals series are always different; you've to get there, but once you're there it's a new ball game," she said.
"It's almost like a little season within a season.
"So just thinking like that, we're in the right position.
"I very much hope they come out ready to put their best netball out there. The season has set them up to be ready for this finals series."
Kent suggested "belief is there among the group".
Under 2018 coach Kate Upton, who was promoted to Collingwood Super Netball assistant, the side won back-to-back semi-final and grand final also from third place.
It coincided with a late-year slump of three losses in the last four against top sides Victorian Fury and Canberra Giants before finals.
"We confided some things within the group, on and off the court, and I think they've been addressed," she said.
"It has been good to be put in different situations in the season. But I am under no illusions that the finals series is going to be tough."
The grand final triumph of last year matters for little to Kent. The squad has changed with three players listed at Super Netball clubs.
Northern Hawks utility Zoe Claridge and Cavaliers midcourter Shelby Miller will wave the flag for Launceston netball in Melbourne.
The pair will be joined by Winnaleah's Kelsie Rainbow, who was last year's ANL player of the finals. But Sharni Lambden is under a fitness cloud and remains in doubt.
Kent insists there are no reasons for the Magpies to feel the pressure of weighty expectations heading into the semi-final on Saturday against NSW Waratahs.
"We haven't had any internal talk about [winning the premiership] in the back half of the season," Kent said.
"I know early on we had addressed expectations that we wanted to be there again.
"Sometimes when you win a premiership, there's complacency among the group.
"So I felt the girls also addressed that before the start of the season that we didn't want to be complacent.
"We only ever wanted to be looking at the grand final until the end of the season.
"Since we talked about it as a goal at the start of the year and discussed some of the things that can happen when you have been a premiership team, we haven't talked about it again once.
"It's probably more of an interest externally than it is to us because I'm a new coach, there are new players within the group, there's a new feel to us and things have been done a bit differently."
But Kent said there is no lack of motivation to beat any of the same three rivals that made the finals last year.
The opportunity to be only the second team to go ANL back-to-back titleholders is sweetened by the omen that they rolled over the top of the Waratahs last year in an 11-goal semi-final victory.
"For the girls now, it's just about the desires and their own internal pressure that is not based on their last year," she said, "but based on them always wanting to be better."