And so Ireland are where they want to be. At the juncture they have never crossed before: a World Cup quarter-final.
Andy Farrell's collective, however, are operating at a level where they believe they can smash through a barrier where teams in the past viewed as insurmountable.
Make no mistake, New Zealand will be gunning for the team in the green jersey next Saturday at the Stade de France. Who would have thought it? Things changed in Soldier Field in 2016. A couple of more wins followed at the Aviva and then Farrell's men claimed a series victory on New Zealand soil in 2022.
In between, however, the All Blacks powered home against Joe Schmidt's flagging collective at the last-eight stage in Japan four years ago.
As a prep for the next instalment - a potential blockbuster in Saint-Denis - the Irish made light work of the Scots. From the moment James Lowe ran in the opening try with barely 60 seconds on the clock, a 17th win in a row for the Six Nations champions felt inevitable.
It was Ireland's most assured performance so far at World Cup 2023, clinical in the extreme, a further reinforcement of the dominance that a few nations now have over the rest.
Injury concerns over Mack Hansen, James Ryan and James Lowe will be addressed over the next 24 hours as the narrative ahead of another quarter-final takes shape
Here's the international view on how the Scots were taken apart.
Green machine flowing to a different rhythm
The gulf between the two teams was crystallised by Jonathan Liew in the Guardian, when saying that Ireland "were moving through a different gravity, playing to a different tempo".
Lew added: "For all the respectful words lavished on the Scots this week, once the game began it was clear that these two teams were on entirely different wavelengths. As Ireland worked their mesmerising patterns Scotland swarmed and chased and regrouped, unaware that they were already two phases behind the game."
MATCH HIGHLIGHTS
A note of caution, however, did follow: "It wasn't a flawless performance, because no team with this many moving parts can ever produce a truly flawless performance. Even in this resounding triumph Farrell will have glimpsed a little headroom, areas to tweak and improve, ways in which the ceiling of this team can be pushed even higher.
"But in the way they started and finished this game, the way they weathered the occasional squalls of pressure, the way they dismantled the Scottish set piece and forced Finn Russell to play on an ever-narrowing tightrope of disaster, they demonstrated something even more important than pure quality: the assurance to play on their own terms."
The strength of the system
Scottish coach Gregor Townsend paid tribute to Ireland's rugby 'system' and says it can reap even more dividends in the years to come.
He told The Herald Scotland: "The way Irish rugby is set up, they could dominate world rugby for the next five to ten years, because they are the number one team in the world and they have a pro rugby system which is very strong, and they've got an age group system that is very strong, so that should continue for them.
"We’ve got to do better. This group of players have got to fifth in the world, which is the best place we’ve ever been in terms of the Scotland national team, but we have to make sure that continues, not for the next couple of years but the next 10 years."
Townsend did try to take some positives from the heavy loss.
"We certainly have to do better, and the responsibility is mine," he said. "We believed we could get out of this pool, and we still believed that after losing to South Africa with the response the players showed in training and the games they played (against Tonga and Romania), gave us an opportunity tonight, which we didn't take.
"Ireland are a better team than us on tonight's performance, and they've won 17 games in a row so they've clearly been the better team over the last couple of years. Now, if we can get on the journey they have been on the last few years then great - but it is easy saying that, it is another thing doing it.
"You become a better team through defeats as well as victories, and we've got to make sure that this defeat makes us a better team for the Six Nations coming up and the next World Cup, although at this point the Six Nations is much more relevant."
'It will take some side to wipe away the emerald smile'
In the Independent, Harry Latham-Coyle lavished praise on a side, who he feels will now be hard to stop. Perhaps, not the talk Irish fans want to hear.
"The pool of death chose its victim; Ireland decisively wielded the scythe. So much for nip-and-tuck contest befitting a knockout occasion – Scotland were swept away like flotsam in a sea of Irish green. If their win over the Springboks was a statement of Rugby World Cup candidacy, here was the sort of showing to strike fear into opponents to come, perhaps the best performance of a winning run now extended through a 17th game.
"Just as a fortnight ago against South Africa, Irish visitors made their way in their thousands down the Parisienne walkways into their home away from home, the Stade de France verdant and vibrant throughout. How their fans will now believe that there might even be three more nights like this, with only a handful of injury frets to count as the cost from a performance of Celtic colossi.
"It will be the All Blacks next Saturday night for Ireland, a mighty foe to be conquered. If this isn't the year that the last eight hoodoo is ended, then perhaps it never will be. Certainly it will take some side to wipe away the emerald smile."
Ireland's foot firmly on the pedal
Looking ahead to the All Blacks game, Tom Vinicombe, writing in rugbypass.com, now envisages a new world order, where Ireland and France look set to contest the World Cup final. He points to New Zealand's inconsistency of late, in failing to deliver a performance for 80 minutes, while adding that Ireland will have a little off it if the three-times World Cup champions are to prevail next weekend.
"If France and Ireland, the two champions of Pools A and B at the 2023 Rugby World Cup, can continue their rich veins of form and best their more decorated opposition at the Stade de France, it will be hard to imagine a situation where the William Webb Ellis Cup doesn't break new frontiers at the end of October.
"Can the All Blacks beat their more fancied opposition at the Stade de France? Absolutely. But it's going to require the best performance New Zealand have put on the park perhaps since Ian Foster took over as head coach in 2020 – and likely also rely on Ireland falling off the wagon for what would be the first time in an impressively long stint.
"Ireland have been consistently strong from match to match since Andy Farrell came on board, but they’ve also played consistent games within matches. They rarely take their foot of the pedal, even for brief moments, and that’s made them impossibly difficult for opposition sides to crack.
"Ireland simply don't switch off – and that’s a worrying proposition for a side like the All Blacks, who have rarely put together 80-minute performances with Foster at the helm. That was especially evident last year, when NZ ceded 15, 14 and 10-point leads against South Africa, Scotland and Australia respectively. While the All Blacks were eventually able to claim victories in each each of those games, they saved their worst for last when they gave up a 19-point lead with nine minutes to play against England in their final game of the season, succumbing to a 25-all draw.
"If the All Blacks don't come out of the blocks firing or switch off at any stage next Saturday – two issues that have been endemic in their game over the past two or three years – they can kiss their chances of a fourth World Cup title good-bye."
