• Nine things we learned from round 16
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• Around the state leagues: Reid injured in VFL return

THE MORNING after the night before, Gold Coast was coming to terms with the biggest, and fair to say, best game of football of the 38 played so far at the redeveloped Metricon Stadium.

The five-point win over Collingwood meant so much for the Suns – on and off the ground – and the club spent Sunday morning reflecting and recalibrating.

At 9-6, the Suns are safely ensconced in the eight for another week. Win just three of their final seven games and they should make the finals. Coach Guy McKenna has never shied away from the club's finals aspirations and chief executive Travis Auld told this column on Sunday morning that planning for the club's maiden finals appearance had already begun.

"We've never made the finals before so from an administrative point of view, we have to start preparing for what the finals would mean for the football club," Auld said. "It is only right to do so."

The Suns are also taking great satisfaction from a list build that looks better and better by the week. Missing superstar Gary Ablett for the second half and with no fit players to rotate off the bench through the last quarter, David Swallow, Harley Bennell, Dion Prestia and Jarrod Harbrow were immense. Sam Day and Tom Lynch kicked six goals between them, while key defenders Rory Thompson and Steven May stood firm.

WATCH: Shoulder shock for Brownlow favourite Ablett
List manager Scott Clayton has never deviated from the script and in the most important game yet played by the club, the team that carries his DNA held its nerve under the most extreme circumstances.

“(There has been) lots of debate and we might have massaged some things on the edges, but the plan has remained in place and the players made some start decisions at the end," marvelled Auld.

Off the ground, Gold Coast is still counting the money after its first "full house" sign, so its worth to the club's bottom line is still to be determined. However, as far as the local economy is concerned, it is believed that the 5000 Collingwood fans to who travelled to the game over the middle weekend of the Victorian school holidays pumped about $5 million into the area.

It is a fixture arrangement that the Suns would like to make permanent but the growing success of the Suns means that Friday night football will likely come calling.

It won't be long before the AFL asks clubs for their fixture requests for next season and Auld believes his club is now ready for the biggest timeslot of the week.

"You've got to earn your spot for Friday night football but I believe we play a brand of football that attracts people so they might be looking to fixture us next year," he said.

"What we're not sure about is the impact on visiting supporters if we play on a Friday night as opposed to Saturday but we're ready to test it and learn more about our market."

Saturday's match was watched by 294,000 people on Fox Footy, which is a healthy figure for the pay-TV broadcaster.

WATCH: Gold Coast v Collingwood - match highlights
And like the win against Geelong a fortnight ago, Auld has welcomed the backslaps, text messages and phone calls that have followed.

"You certainly become more relevant in the sporting landscape after a win like that. A lot of the people who have been on the journey from the start, including our major partners, also get to share in the enjoyment and the excitement," he said.
 

Are the Pies suddenly a bit shaky?

The other side of the coin is Collingwood and if we're talking about the Suns as 'likely finalists' as opposed to certainties then it is the same for the Magpies, who are also sitting at 9-6 and looking just that bit precarious.

The Pies were slick early against the Suns and every bit in the mood to play the party pooper on the biggest day yet for football on the Gold Coast.

But their ball movement stank after quarter-time and Travis Cloke after such an imperious start, couldn't kick straight.

It was an unusual performance from a team coached by Nathan Buckley, which is so driven by process and structure. They were belted at clearances after quarter-time and missed Luke Ball in the clutches, but they just couldn't shut down Gold Coast's aforementioned ball-winners.

Poor Clinton Young. He was made the scapegoat after dropping a straightforward mark 30 metres out from goal with two minutes to go, which had he held and converted, the Pies would likely have won. He also missed a sitter on the run in the second term when Collingwood was in control of the game.

WATCH: Clinton Young's blooper gifts the Suns the game
Buckley said all the right things afterwards when asked about Young's late clanger, but the wingman will be battling his inner demons until next Sunday's MCG clash with Essendon, which given the state of the ladder, is now a massive match.

At least Young will get to atone for this mistake. He fell over in the defensive goalsquare in the last quarter of the 2012 Grand Final and conceded a critical goal to the Swans while playing for Hawthorn and never played for the club again, after accepting a free agency move to the Magpies in the days after the game.
 

QUESTION TIME

Who is the pride of South Australia?
A fortnight ago, it was clearly Port Adelaide, but much can happen in two weekends. Port has lost two straight and might have forfeited its hopes of a top-two finish for good, while the Crows are surging. Injuries to Jackson Trengove and Alipate Carlisle have knocked Port's structure around and there are now clear signs that a relatively young side is feeling the pinch of such a bustling start to the season. Richmond at Etihad Stadium on Sunday will be a tricky encounter for Port to navigate. The Crows host Hawthorn in a slashing Friday night clash, but the most important person at Adelaide might be Andrew Potter, the club medical director. Scott Thompson (leg), Daniel Talia (corked buttock), Ben Rutten (concussion), and most noticeably, Patrick Dangerfield (knee) all emerged injured from an otherwise routine thrashing of the Giants on Saturday. That quartet plays on Friday night and the Crows probably start favourites. Some or all of them don't and it will be tough.

What should Nick Riewoldt do from here?
An unedifying spectacle at the Saints this week with some mindless finger-pointing between former coach Scott Watters and president Peter Summers over who was behind decisions to let Brendon Goddard, Nick Dal Santo and Ben McEvoy depart the club in the last two years. Whether Riewoldt's name was thrown up as part of such discussions is doubtful, but the magnificent St Kilda warrior, who will later this season become the club's longest-serving captain, might need some convincing about whether to continue next year. The Saints are in the midst of a rebuild, but it will long and torturous with estimations of perhaps six years before the club is next in premiership mode. By then Riewoldt will be a first-ballot Hall-of-Fame inductee. The process promises to be just as bleak as 2014 and Riewoldt's frustration boiled over on several occasions against Carlton on Sunday. He needs a serious decompress at his off-season Texas locale at the end of the season before deciding whether to continue next season, because 2015 shapes a joyless grind once again for the Saints. A bit like Jonathan Brown, Riewoldt owes his club nothing after such a distinguished career.
WATCH: Nick Riewoldt goes it alone against the Blues
Can a 13-point defeat be construed as a win?
Almost. The plucky performance by the Western Bulldogs at Simonds Stadium on Sunday was nearly as good as a win. The Dogs held the edge in clearances, inside 50s and contested possessions and held Joel Selwood to just 13 possessions (does that earn Mitch Wallis Brownlow votes?) but what they didn't have was Jimmy Bartel, Steve Johnson, Harry Taylor and Corey Enright – big of body and long in tooth. The Bulldogs are building, a bit too slowly for some, but in two years' time, when they win so many of the key stats as they did convincingly on Sunday and can convert a few more of those half-chances, they'll win the match.
AB: Neither, according to coach Leon Cameron and I tend to agree. He is simply a good footballer down on form, but you have to wonder with seven games left in the season whether a spell in the twos is on the cards for Cameron as much for him to build up his confidence as it would allow the Giants a chance to give Tom Boyd a few weeks of sustained and uninterrupted senior football.

AB: I'm starting to think there might be a touch of the Stuart Dew about Lake in that he was brought to Hawthorn to help win a premiership and after doing so in his first year, had little to offer thereafter. While the premiership window is ajar, the Hawks need Lake if he's fit and motivated, but the episode of the weekend what the sort of 'bad Brian' that Bulldogs supporters warned us about when he made the switch. I'm more interested in what motivated both Alastair Clarkson and Jordan Lewis to call him out publicly. That was very un-Hawthorn like. In any event, Lake's battles this year is why many are convinced that the Hawks are the frontrunners to secure Melbourne's James Frawley at the end of this season as an unrestricted free agent.

AB: We at AFL Media issue our own 3-2-1 votes after each match that forms the basis of our own Brownlow preview at the end of the season. A few of my colleagues have been a bit tardy with their votes, but even so, we have Ablett about five votes ahead of Lance Franklin and Joel Selwood. Ablett could be back before the end of the season, but may struggle to dominate if he does, so start keeping an eye on Franklin.

AB: The Sydney Swans' win over West Coast puts them a game clear on top of the ladder, but only twice since the introduction of the final eight in 1994 has the top of the ladder been as congested as it is now after 16 rounds, with four teams sitting a game behind the Swans. At a similar stage in 2004, St Kilda, the Brisbane Lions, Port Adelaide and Melbourne were all 12-4, with Geelong at 10-6. Two years ago, we had the Swans, Adelaide and Collingwood all 12-3, with Hawthorn, West Coast and Essendon all a game behind. Every game involving the top four teams from now on is critical, irrespective of the opponent and what is now clear is that a really good team, likely one of Hawthorn, Geelong and Port, will finish fifth and need to win four knock-out finals to win the premiership. I'm still on the Swans and Fremantle to finish 1-2 and their significant home ground advantage still puts them in the box seat to make the Grand Final.