Clarkson said the challenge for the club was to continue its progression as an AFL force and he pointed to the next wave of players set to push for positions next year.
"Tommy Murphy and Simon Taylor were enormously unlucky not to be selected for today's game and we 'ummed' and 'ahhed' on Tuesday and Wednesday about what would be the best combination for us," Clarkson said in his post-match media confence.
"We've got guys on our list – [Max] Bailey, [Mitch] Thorp, [Beau] Dowler, plus other players too, who we regard really, really highly and they haven't even scratched the surface as players that could contribute at senior AFL level yet. We've got high hopes for those lads."
Clarkson said the club never set any limitations on how far it could go in 2008, saying it "never put a ceiling on the group in terms of their development and their growth as a group".
"What we had done is studied models of teams that have developed a premiership group over time. It was quite common that to be in a group together that it usually took five, six, seven or eight years," Clarkson said referring to Geelong, Port Adelaide and St Kilda.
"So many sides have jumped up to play in the finals series and then fallen away the following year and that could quite possibly have been the case with a young group. But such was the resolve of this particular group, their fanaticism to improve as people and players drove the whole group forward again this year.
"We got ourselves into a position where we won the first nine games of the season and that was the real realisation that we could finish top four and give it a real nudge, if we got some momentum going in September.
"Since the Richmond loss in round 20, when we were really poor … our playing group in particular … has been first class in demanding the standard of training that would hopefully get us through to the last day in September."
Clarkson likened the win to Adelaide's 1998 premiership.
"It was similar to the grand final that North Melbourne and Adelaide contested in the late '90s when the Kangas couldn't put the score on the board and split the game open," Clarkson said.
"We were really fortunate to hang in there. We were really lucky to still be in the game at half-time to be truthful. Geelong dominated the second quarter."
As for how he felt after the match, Clarkson said it was an overwhelming feeling.
"There is so much hard work that goes into winning a premiership. I know that the 22 players and a coach probably draw a lot of accolades, but there is just so much work into getting yourself into a position to even contest in a grand final," Clarkson said.
"I suppose it'll sink in over the next couple of weeks that we've actually won one, but it's a little bit surreal at the minute."
