The effort was there but Gold Coast lacked the polish to hold off a fast-finishing Brisbane in QClash16, going down by four points at Metricon Stadium.
In a fiery but scrappy match, the SUNS took advantage of the Lions' inaccuracy in front of goal to jump to a nine-point lead early in the final quarter.
Stuart Dew's men couldn’t hold on for the upset, with the Lions kicking three straight goals to retake the lead and eventually the match with a 10.18 (78) to 11.8 (74) win.
While disappointed with the loss, Dew said it was promising that his players’ intensity at the contest was there, because polish could be worked on but the endeavour to attack the ball couldn’t.
"I think both sides will look back and see they had chances. Ours late, they had a lot of chances early," Dew said.
"Obviously some poor goal kicking from them, but I thought we had some chances late."
While the SUNS went winless at home for the 2018 season, with the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games notably keeping them from Metricon Stadium for the first half of the season, Dew said fans could see some promising signs for next season.
"For our fans tonight, our last home game, hopefully they’ve got a lot to look forward to next year and realise that what we're trying to build is effort for four quarters," he said.
"We obviously brought it for a couple of quarters tonight. At times we lacked the polish, but we'd rather work on the polish than the effort."
Brisbane's Nick Robertson set the fuse for a fiery QClash when he said the Gold Coast players were "soft" during the week.
The spot fires broke out several times throughout the match, but Dew said the inflammatory words weren’t used as motivation by his team.
"We'll respect all opposition at all times and I think our boys put their head over the ball all night, we'll see some good examples of that," Dew said.
Brisbane star Dayne Zorko and the SUNS' Touk Miller continued their bad blood, with both players niggling each other throughout the game.
Even the traditional post-game handshake looked like it could spark into a brawl.
Dew said it was a good battle again after Miller won the honours in QClash15 earlier this year.
"It was a good battle and I think… probably ask both players, they probably enjoy it, it’s a great challenge, it brings the best out in each other," he said.
"Probably an even battle all night. I thought Dayne (Zorko) fought through it a fair bit, Touk (Miller) stuck to his task, he plays fair I think he showed good discipline.
"It's good to watch isn’t it? It’s a game within a game, we talked about it before, there's little match ups around the place. Even Brayden Fiorini and Jack Bowes lining up on ‘Beamsy’ (Dayne Beams) for little parts.
"You sit there and you hope the lads are learning. I mean he's an A-grader isn’t he? Surely All-Australian, he's had a terrific year and a challenging year so (there's) lots to learn off the really good players of the opposition."
Dew hailed the improved recent performances of Jack Bowes, who spent more time in the midfield and gave the SUNS plenty of drive, and also praised Alex Sexton's four-goal haul.
