New skipper Sam Mitchell said the Hawks were still haunted by the 33-point loss to the Kangaroos that crushed their flag hopes, and were united in their resolve to make the capitulation a distant memory this coming year.
"It's something we touch on," Mitchell said on Friday.
"I guess sometimes you forget what the real footy is like, because you just do so much training. We watched a bit of footage the other day and it's almost like you forget what footy jumpers look like because you haven't worn them for so long.
"Whenever we think of last year, and when people talk to us and say we're going to have a good year, all I think about and all we try and think about is the Kangaroos game in the finals when we were very, very ordinary.
"We got knocked out when we thought we were going along okay, and we probably got a little bit ahead of ourselves, and we never want to make that mistake again."
The process of avoiding such a mistake has begun for the club already, with Mitchell dismissing any suggestion the Hawks will view 2008 a missed opportunity if they don’t finish in the top four.
"Since Clarko has been at the club, and it's also part of our leadership group views, we don't want to set a roof to where we can go," he said.
"We don't want to say top four, we don't want to say top eight, or say win here or win there. You don't know what's going to happen throughout the season.
"There's probably 16 AFL clubs that want to finish up the top of the AFL ladder, and we don't know how we're going to go compared to them until we come up and play them.
"All we can do is prepare the best we can. At the moment, we think we're well placed to give it a good crack if things fall our way.
"You've got to have a bit of luck in the game, and hopefully that's on our side this year."
The Hawks will commence their assault on the NAB Cup when they meet the Swans on Sunday 17 February at Aurora Stadium in Launceston.
