With both the Dogs and the Hawks finishing their home-and-away seasons on Saturday, both sides can finally turn their full attention to the upcoming final, which they've known has been coming for the past month.
Akermanis said the club's form wasn't that bad but maintaining intensity in the middle would be the Dogs' main focus this weekend.
"We've pretty much been in winning positions in all of those games [in the past seven weeks], and we've played some terrific footy within there," Akermanis told Channel Seven on Sunday.
"You're thinking that results mean we've played terrible, and when we haven't, we've been super competitive.
"Every game we've had just one bad quarter, and even yesterday we didn't have a bad quarter.
"If you think about that, you know that the form is there. It's much better than you think. Our pressure needs to be right up. You know how Hawthorn is going to play, in a sense, and they are just like Brisbane; they've got two very good forward line players.
"If our pressure isn't up in the midfield … no team is going to beat Hawthorn."
He conceded the Bulldogs didn't have as much to play for as Adelaide on Saturday, given their top-three spot had been assured for weeks while the Crows were aiming towards a top-four finish.
"When it comes to push and shove, there really is no excuse but yesterday was a dead rubber for us," he said.
"It didn't mean anything to us if we won or lost, we just wanted to make sure we were really competitive in getting some good momentum coming into finals."
With Adelaide now likely to finish fourth, it looks like facing the reigning premiers Geelong in the first week of finals.
Akermanis said there was no reason why the Crows couldn't push the Cats next weekend, despite the dominant status Mark Thompson's men have built themselves over the past two years.
"They've [the Crows] got the talent, they always have," he said.
"Whether they can match Geelong early … I'd love to see it, and I think everyone is looking forward to play Geelong if you get the chance.
"This is going to be an awesome finals series, and now the passion and everything goes up a level, and the prize is so much bigger.
"The Crows, if anyone is going to do it next week, it may as well be them and they'll give them a real big run for their money."
