After the 1-2-3 in the league and Mayo's rampaging display in Killarney, we were tentatively beginning to speculate on the possibility of an all-Connacht All-Ireland decider.
We had visions of David Brady and Ja Fallon arm wrestling on Up for the Match.
It would have been the Connacht old firm game to end them all. A chance for Galway to inflict the cruelest blow on Mayo, a loss so unbearable that they might finally be persuaded to abandon the decades long quest altogether and embrace the League of Ireland instead. Or for Mayo to claim the sweetest victory of all and put an end to the modern Galway tradition of post-All-Ireland schadenfreude, aka, no more Monday morning viral Whatsapp voice notes taunting their neighbours.
We now know for sure it won't be a Connacht decider as the Rossies have again taken their leave of the championship just as things were getting serious.
In the bitter aftermath of their costly slip-ups last Sunday, there was a slightly less than 50 percent chance of the two counties being drawn together in the draw, though no one had any respect for the laws of mathematical probability that night.
Regrets? These two have a few. The league finalists were supposed to collide on a grander stage than the preliminary quarter-final, which many don't believe should exist to begin with.
Watch the Salthill showdown between Galway and Mayo this Sunday on @rteone and @rteplayer from 2.40pm #rtegaa pic.twitter.com/K0t3ZroVJT
— RTÉ GAA (@RTEgaa) June 24, 2023
Galway's stint as power ranking darlings came to an end in the febrile atmosphere of Carrick-on-Shannon last Sunday evening.
With only a draw required, the boys in maroon were nursing possession deep in injury time in line with best practice.
Then John Daly got caught out by the bounce on Peter Cooke's pass infield, Andrew Murnin raced onto the break, judiciously slumped to the ground within reasonable distance of the goal and we know the rest.
Midway through the second half, Galway supporters might have assumed that there was nothing much to worry about, that even a narrow-ish loss against a fairly pumped Armagh side would have had minimal consequences in any event.
They hadn't banked on Tyrone's late implosion up in Cavan, the 2021 champions' stubbornly defying prophecies of their imminent revival - at least until the knockout stages.
The unfortunate confluence of events was almost reminiscent of their hurlers exit at the round robin stage in 2019. At least Joyce's team have a chance to recover.
Most worryingly of all was the injury to their nominal full-back/tireless raider from deep Seán Kelly, alongside the continued doubts about the state of Damien Comer's hamstring.
Prior to last weekend, Galway had slipped into the role of default pick for the All-Ireland among the podcasting community, albeit usually after them throwing their hands in the air and declaring there was no outstanding team ("I dunno like... Galway?").
It was noted that Mayo pundits were especially keen to put them there, including our own Lee and Cora. Here at least, we detected a note of the longstanding Kerry practice of talking up that outcome which you most fear so as to sabotage it on some karmic level.
On paper, they still look like one of the most compelling contenders, with their now supremely honed and modern defensive structure (such a change from early 2010s Galway) and formidably gifted attack. A couple of analysts decried the tendency towards individualism up front.
Shane Walsh, whose status as a talent on the level of David Clifford or Con O'Callaghan was called into question this week, certainly plays the game to his own rhythm in attack. Despite the couple of costly misses, from the penalty spot and in the last play, Walsh actually delivered one of his better displays of 2023 last Sunday.
If Galway's loss to Armagh was unfortunate and a touch careless, then Mayo's defeat to Cork was inexplicable.
We had heard earlier that Mayo had revitalised their attacking game, and learned to harness this physical specimen named Aidan O'Shea, via this revolutionary method of kicking the ball into him as opposed to soloing it incessantly down the throat of a 12-man defence.
Evidently cracking the code of modern Gaelic football wasn't quite so simple as that and Mayo were forced back into old habits at the weekend.
Kevin Walsh's role in the Cork backroom team was heavily flagged last week. He has become the most celebrated right-hand man outside of Paul Kinnerk.
Notwithstanding the recent moral panic about teams passing backwards and sideways, Mayo's apparent phobia for doing the same has been highlighted as one of their fatal flaws.
In his column this week, Lee Keegan suggested that Mayo's boredom threshold was too low to enable them to prosper in the modern game.
"At a certain stage, it seems we get bored and decide we need to have a pot at goal," he wrote. "There's no shot clock, I can't understand why. They don't have to shoot."
In mitigation, the Cork footballers, after a decade as everyone's favourite whipping boy, may be slowly recovering their mojo. They are almost in a position analogous to Galway circa 2016, with Walsh prominent in the endeavour but Mayo letting slip a six-point lead represented a shocking implosion.
That they even had to avail of the controversial third qualifying place added a further comic post-script.
O'Shea's decision to pass up the chance of a last-minute point indicated that teams aren't fully attuned to the minutiae of score difference - although, perhaps, in their bullishness, Mayo felt they didn't need to brief themselves on the ins and outs beforehand. Given Mayo's championship record in Castlebar, he might have turned it down in any case.
As regards Galway-Mayo, home advantage has worked in reverse for the guts of two decades anyway. Anecdotally, the Galway support, outnumbered heavily in Leitrim last weekend, regarded the atmosphere as a touch heated in Páirc Sean. Well, it should be plenty spicy in Salthill with everything at stake on Sunday afternoon.
Jim Carney lamented several years ago that the relatively friendly Galway-Mayo rivalry of yesteryear had given way to something slightly more narky and spiteful. "A bit of badness has crept in," he told Keith Duggan, mournfully.
Some trace it back to Andy Moran celebrating like Marco Tardelli after scoring the fourth goal in Salthill in 2013; others to Comer tweeting that Keegan had it coming after his dust-up with Diarmuid Connolly in 2015.
Perhaps it's wrong to look at a single moment and we should instead see the cooling of relations as part of a broader societal trend. The increased coverage of the sport has rendered the rivalry a bit Premier League.
Back in the innocent days, Galway would play Mayo in the Connacht championship, they'd win or they'd lose (regardless of Willie Joe's involvement - contrary to the song lyric, Mayo's record against Galway in his playing career was no better than 50:50), there'd be a report in the paper the following day and that'd be the end of it.
Galway's millennial supporters might say with some justification that their genial forebears did not have to listen to former Mayo players talking about Mayo on the internet 24/7.
Form, structure and a perusal of the team-sheets would lead one to give the nod to Galway. The recent history, however, is with Mayo, who dumped their neighbours out of the championship three years running. You have to go back to MacHale Park '98 for the last time Galway beat Mayo in knockout football.
Cillian O'Connor, who was left off with the club last weekend (where he ran riot), is recalled for the do-or-die tussle with the neighbours.
Seán Kelly and Damien Comer are officially reported to be available - as Lee Keegan swears he hoped they would be.
Either way, one of the supposed big five among the contenders in this most democratic of football championships will slink away this afternoon.
Watch Galway v Mayo in the All-Ireland Football Championship on Sunday from 3pm on RTÉ One and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on RTÉ.ie/Sport and the RTÉ News app or listen to live updates on Sunday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
