Highlanders celebrate their win during the fourth tour match between The British and Irish Lions and the Highlanders at Forsyth Barr Stadium. Photo / Brett Phibbs.
It's one small step back for the Lions and one giant leap forward for New Zealand Rugby and the Highlanders.
The men from the South played with everything, showed all they had, mixed it up between smart back play and crunching forward work and held on with the best, best defensive effort.
It was a magical night for the Highlanders - another win against the Lions to match the one Otago secured in 1993.
Just as brave, just as creative and just as damaging for the visitors who might feel they have gone back to square one, or close to it.
They couldn't hold the ball when they needed to. They couldn't make the big plays under pressure and their forwards, well, they were well beaten.
At the scrum, in the loose and in the collision. The warning has made for these Lions, if they can't slow the game down to their pace, they aren't anywhere near the same team.
With a dry ball on a dry track, the Lions couldn't hit the Highlanders so hard on the gainline in the same way they did the Crusaders in Christchurch.
The Highlanders were ready for that, recycled quicker, kept moving the point of contact and then slipped it out the back door when the heat really came on.
They also used a range of creative kicks to get in behind the Lions and Teihorangi Walden was a bit of a class act all on his won with that. He had an incredible ability to see the space and use his boot to get it there and the All Blacks will have been taking note of that.
As much as the Lions wanted to use their defence as an offensive weapon, they couldn't quite do it and that enabled the Highlanders to indulge in their favoured high tempo, wide-wide game and load up the aerobic content.
For the Highlanders the first half was all about stretching the Lions one way, then the other and getting the ball into the hands of both Malakai Fekitoa and Waisake Naholo, who both had points to prove for different reasons.
Fekitoa, unwanted by the All Blacks, was bristling attitude without over doing it. He ran hard but with awareness and accuracy to ensure there were no wild offloads or poor decisions.
As for his tackling - that was world class. Naholo, with his first touch, managed to go from a standing start with four Lions in front of him, to charging down the wing. With his second he nearly dived in at the corner and then nailed it with his third when he popped up at first receive and smashed over - sadly collecting Courtney Lawes' head along the way in what was a nasty blow for the big Englishman.
The second half, or most of it, was about using the precision of Marty Banks to play them into position and then crunch the Lions a bit in the forwards. It was a nice contrast to their earlier work and meant they were attacking inside Lions territory.
The forwards loved it. Rose to the challenge and of all the pre match predictions not one suggested it would be the power of the Highlanders scrum that would be the most notable feature of the game.
Highlanders 23 (W. Naholo, L. Coltman tries; L. Sopoaga con, 2 pens; M. Banks con, pen)
British & Irish Lions 22 (J. Joseph, T. Seymour, S. Warburton tries; D. Biggar 2 cons, pen)
Hagley Oval has a new head groundsman ahead of the first test of the summer.