As the football championship season begins its winding journey this weekend, newly crowned Division 4 champions Sligo find themselves eyeing up a very pronounced fork in the road.
Over the next few weeks, their entire season will dramatically diverge one way or the other with two very different destinations on offer.
Take the correct turn and Tony McEntee's side will be where they want to be – in the race for Sam Maguire and facing possible big day outings against the likes of Kerry and Dublin in the new round-robin format.
Get lost along the way by failing to make the Connacht final and it’s a second year in the Tailteann Cup. Not that they mean any disrespect to the second-tier competition, but one of Sligo, Leitrim, New York or London, who they face in Ruislip on Saturday, will be in the top 16 competition, and the Yeats County want to be the side that takes advantage of the group 1 or 2 All-Ireland seedings potentially on offer.
It could be argued that they would be better off missing out and instead challenging for a trophy that they would likely have a good shot of winning, but as attacking ace Pat Spillane Jnr explains, Sligo simply aren’t thinking that way.
"Playing at a higher standard, playing those top-quality teams is what brings on a team," he told RTÉ Sport.
"From a championship perspective, the opportunity to be going up against some of those top Division 1 teams would do so much for this group, particularly the young players. We’d look to embrace that battle."
Not that Spillane is jumping the gun, far from it. The 25-year-old, who has featured in all nine of Sligo’s games this year, saw enough in his first season with the team in 2022 to know that while the 'one game at a time’ mantra is a clichéd one, it’s still a phrase that deserves respect.
Twice last year McEntee’s charges came close to what would have been embarrassing losses.
In their Connacht opener in the Bronx, Spillane made his championship debut, with his father Pat Snr on commentary duty for GAAGO, in difficult circumstances with New York reeling them in as the American outfit chased a first provincial win.
With three minutes remaining, the sides were level before Sligo clipped over four points without reply to progress.
After a semi-final loss to Roscommon, their first-ever Tailteann Cup game saw them struggle to a home win over this weekend’s opponents with extra-time required to separate the sides.
"What the management team have done a great job this year is keeping us really focussed – one game at a time, one objective at a time," Spillane said.
"If we had gone into the Leitrim game [round seven league game] thinking about a potential final then that would have been a distraction.
"We know there’s a big incentive there for us if we have a successful couple of weeks, but all we can do is take it one game at a time."
"It’s a really tricking opener and we’ll really take the learnings from last year," he continued.
"We’re all preparing for a really challenging atmosphere, we know London are going to massively raise their game as well, they’re going to bring massive intensity. We’ll be trying to match that."
Objective is a word that continually escapes Spillane's mouth and one of those was achieved at the weekend as they were promoted from Division 4 as champions after their final win over Wicklow at Croke Park on Saturday.
Given that their league season started with a heavy home loss to Laois, it now means that they enter the championship arena on the back of a seven-game winning streak.
Spillane has been crucial to that run and with 2-13 to his name, he is the side’s top scorer from play this season. He puts that scoring return down to the advice received from the straight-talking McEntee.
"For me he has identified a couple of my strengths and he’s trying to get me to embrace it as much as I can," Spillane said of his manager.
"My running power, getting on the end of moves, chipping in with scores, he’s asking me to bring that to the team."
If Spillane can bring those elements, it will help Sligo’s chances of reaching the Sam Maguire race and the possibility of coming up against his native Kerry, Dublin, where he is based mostly for work, or maybe even Armagh to set up a reunion for his manager.
Lose either this weekend or in the semi-final against New York and London and their season will have an entirely different outlook. It’s set to be that sort of summer.
Watch Mayo v Roscommon in the Connacht Football Championship on Sunday from 3.15pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/Sport and the RTÉ News app or listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
