Lavington quick Luke Docherty produced a lively spell to destroy Corowa's premiership dream in a matter of minutes on Saturday.
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The Riverina quick tore through former Australian player Dan Christian (0), Matt Grantham (0) and Ben Mitchell (3) to leave the visitors reeling and they never recovered.
The strong crowd was hoping to see power hitting from Christian, but the right-arm Docherty quickly took the 'air out of the game'.
"The plan was to nick him off and I just wanted to come a little wider of the crease to get that angle and it worked, dumb luck really," he suggested.
The Griffith product, in his second year at the Panthers, had battled a hamstring complaint around a month ago.
"There was also a bit of stiffness in the back the last few weeks, but I just had to tell myself only a few more overs to go and then there's six months off," he said.
Corowa captain Jarryd Hatton, who would be vying with Docherty and a few others for the title of the association's quickest bowler, said the aggressive quick and Ryan Brown (1-8 off 10 overs) were too good.
"The game was evidently won today with the new prune (ball)," he detailed.
"You can't fault our batting, they just bowled extremely well with the new ball and it's a credit to them, they're a bunch of really good blokes."
Christian, arguably the biggest signing in CAW's 166 years, was playing his first Provincial game in six weeks, although he had been playing a Legends event in Sri Lanka.
"It (the season) was really enjoyable, disappointing day today, but the boys should be very proud of how they went," he said.
Corowa's left-field signing of Christian, through a friendship with Mitchell, was one of the highlights of the season, along with Corowa's surge to its first grand final.
Bottom of the ladder in Wangaratta and District in 2016-17, Corowa made the move to CAW District, winning the flag in its first year with a handful of players who tackled Lavington.
Although it was a disappointing performance with the bat, being skittled for 86, the club's effort in winning through to a decider, with the added bonus of attracting big crowds to home games, has been a feel-good story.
And it's been another bumper year for CAW, highlighted by another 10,000-plus crowd to the Big Bash in December, along with the 312 to the Hall of Fame-presentation function last Wednesday.
