THE rain might have teamed down at Carrington Park, but on Saturday night a 273-day drought broke for the Wests Tigers.
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Last season's wooden spooners upset defending premiers Penrith 12-8 in an epic edition of the annual NRL match in Bathurst.
While he'd been heavily criticised this season, it was halfback Luke Brooks who inspired the Tigers to snap a losing streak which dated back to round 20 last year when they beat the Brisbane 32-18.
A pair of 40-20 kicks which led to tries, a try assist, four tackle breaks and 69 metres from 10 runs from Brooks all helped the Tigers to claim the Royce Simmons Cup in wet conditions before a capacity Bathurst crowd.
"I think Luke Brooks played incredible, his kicking game was A1 today, and I couldn't be happier for him, he really led us in the second half," Tigers captain Api Koroisau said.
"He had a good game," Tigers coach Tim Sheens added. "Both halves played well, that's their second game together."
The win was also the Tigers' first under Sheens since the 2005 premiership winning coach has returned to the helm.
He said he felt it was a win his men had been building towards.
"As you'd imagine they're ecstatic with it it, it's not just a win, it's a really good win," Sheens said.
"I didn't think we did anything to not deserve it, there was no luck in it, we worked really, really hard.
"Playing a Cleary-led Penrith side and beating them today up here is a great effort from the team.
"The first win of the season after we've worked so hard, given the pressure we were under ... we've had a lot of issues, I'm not going to offer any excuses, but over the last three weeks we were building for that."
It was Brooks who came up with the first two big plays of the match, played in front of a huge crowd despite the constant rain.
Firstly, with 50 seconds gone, a Brooks 40-20 gave Tigers an attacking set on Panthers' line.
Brooks' second kick was even better, rolling in goal and beating diving Penrith fullback Dylan Edwards. Brandon Wakeham grounded it then added the extras to give Tigers a surprise lead after four minutes.
Just as a kick set up the first try, it was the same for the second.
This time it was the boot of Jarome Luai that helped Panthers come up with a reply in the 11th minute, the five-eighth rolling a grubber through the Tigers' line.
Tyrone Peachey won the race to ground the ball, the Wellington Cowboys product making it three tries in his four NRL career matches at Carrington Park.
While Peachey drew the cheers of fans, it was boos for fellow Wellington Cowboys graduate Brent Naden soon after.
The Wests Tigers centre was sinbinned in the 17th minute and placed on report for a shoulder charge on Panthers second rower Zac Hosking.
But the Tigers didn't conceded while Naden was the bin, even repelling consecutive sets following a line drop out.
Eleven out from the break a penalty goal to Stephen Crichton put Penrith in the lead for the first time at 8-6.
However, it was the Tigers who looked the more dangerous and enjoyed more of the possession - 54 percent for the half.
Three minutes out from the break, following a charge down, it took a brilliant Edwards tackle to hold out Naden.
But penalty goal to Wakeham after the half-time siren locked it up at 8-all.
Brooks pulled off his second 40-20 nine minutes into the second half. Again it led to a Tigers try, this time David Nofoaluma crossing in the right corner to make it 12-8.
It was his 100th NRL try.
With 24 minutes left Nathan Cleary - as he's so often done - looked as if he'd swung things back in Panthers favour as he stepped his way through the Tigers defence.
He ran 20 metres but as he dived over the line, Tigers fullback Jahream Bula did enough to see the ball bobble out of Cleary's grasp.
Another blow followed for Penrith when Soni Luke was sinbinned for hip drop on Alex Twal with 12 minutes left on the clock.
Though Wakeham missed his resulting shot at goal in the end it didn't matter.
Penrith coach Ivan Cleary said the Tigers deserved the win and that his side played well below its best.
"I think in the conditions they played better so they deserve a lot of credit, but we didn't play real smart tonight, yeah bad football tonight," he said.
"It's very disappointing ... we definitely feel like we added to the loss ourselves tonight. It was a bad start, they were up 6-0 before we touched the ball.
"When Nado went off to the bin we were awful, that was really disappointing, and we didn't quite get it right after that either.
"I thought we defended manfully for long periods, but we defended way too often"
- WESTS TIGERS 12 (Brandon Wakeham, David Nofoaluma tries; Brandon Wakeham 2 goals) defeated PENRITH PANTHERS 8 (Tyrone Peachey try; Stephen Crichton 2 goals)
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