On Saturday night, Sonny Bill Williams became the first All Black to receive a red card since 1967. Then the All Blacks went on to lose their first home test match since 2009.
But this pales in significance to some of our historical sporting catastrophes.
We all know the more recent disasters (like Rugby World Cups and the 2013 America's Cup) but what about our earlier history?
Our regular historian Grant Morris has been looking back on sporting disasters in New Zealand, mainly on pre-1960 disasters in the three big team sports: football, cricket and rugby
1946 cricket match between Australia and NZ. Photo: supplied
