An impressive season in the National League was brought to an end for Barnet on Tuesday night, as playoff heartbreak saw them beaten narrowly by rivals Boreham Wood.
The Bees retained most of the early possession, but couldn't prevent a 19th-minute opener from Lee Ndlovu, before the striker added another to distance the visitors on the stroke of half time.
There was a second-half fightback from Barnet, however it just wasn't to be their day, or season, with one goal all they could manage throughout numerous chances.
Manager Dean Brennan spoke to club media following his side's exit at the first hurdle of the playoff campaign.
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"Should have defended better"
With Boreham Wood making the 30-minute round trip to the Hive, it was never going to be an easy task for the hosts, who came up against the best defensive team in the division.
One thing they strictly couldn't do if they wanted to progress on the road to Wembley was fall behind, and they did just that, but in a double blow.
The Wood's statistic of having only ever lost a match from a winning position just once this term didn't look a promising sight for Brennan's Bees either.
The manager spoke to press after the game: "It's tough to take. I thought we performed to a good level, thought we had a lot of entries in the first twenty minutes.
"There was a glorious chance for [Fin] Potter at the back post, and really, probably with their first real attempt at our goal, they have scored around the 18th minute.
"To be honest, not enough of our players in the first half have come to the party - they know that, I told them at half time.
"You can't give a team like Boreham Wood a two-goal start as they have got a brilliant defensive record, they are defensively organised.
"And from our point of view, the goal right on half time was a real kick in the teeth, so full credit to Boreham Wood, they have done a job on us in the end, but I thought we had enough chances to win the game, but it is not about that in the playoffs.
"You need a little bit of luck, a little bit of the rub of the green and we should have defended better in the first half."
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Looking forward
Despite a disappointing end to the campaign for Brennan and Barnet, it has been nothing short of a spectacular one, with rare pre-season playoff predictions for the North London club.
Having finished 2022/23 with one of the highest goal tallies in the National League, and managing to break into the top five is an achievement alone, even though promotion back to the EFL would have been the ultimate prize.
Barnet can look back all they like, at the playoff defeat and a penalty shootout denial of Wembley in the FA Trophy, but it is all about whether they can go one better next year.
"We have just come up short, and my job next season is to make sure we don't come up short," affirmed Brennan.
"[The players] should be proud of themselves in a lot of ways, but I want to create a real winning mentality here, and at the end of the day, we haven't had the killer winner mentality tonight, and we didn't in the FA Trophy semi-final either."
The Bees' boss was also keen to offer his congratulations to his victorious opponents who now travel to Notts County in the semi-final.
"We have only got ourselves to blame really, but we have to look at ourselves, we have to congratulate Boreham Wood, they did a good job on us, causing counter-attacks several times in the first half.
"We have got to improve in the summer and it will be my job to do that."