"Now you can think 'that's pretty neat'. You feel humbled just to be part of it," says the 54-year-old. Yet Hansen makes it clear it is only a staging post. "I think we can get better next year and we must because everybody else will improve."
He is having to improve as a coach too. At half-time last weekend, with his men rattled, tired and down 22-7, here was the perfect gauge of how Hansen has developed his own art.
It is easy to believe that, with an image of being a bit of an old-fashioned, dour Kiwi bruiser, this one-time Christchurch-beat policeman might have gone in for some serious ear bashing. Not a bit of it.
"My image? In some ways, I don't care what people think. It's irrelevant.What matters is that my athletes understand what I'm like and I understand them," he says.
"When I was a kid, if mum and dad and teachers screamed and yelled at me it would turn me off. Coaches doing that doesn't actually fix the problem.
"I knew at half-time our attitude had been good so there was no need to give them a roasting. It was about bringing them together, showing them I actually still believed in them, that they could still do it."
A remarkable triumph ensued, one to elevate Hansen's status as a coaching master in his own right rather than just being seen as Graham Henry's old sidekick or, as many in Wales still remember him, as a grumpy failure running the national team a decade ago.
Yet Hansen swears it was during that tough two-and-a-half year spell in charge of Wales that the seeds of his current astonishing success were sown. "I think about it every day when I'm coaching because I learned so much there," he says.
It was a huge culture shock to be thrown into an alien, highly political environment after luxuriating in a winning regime back home in Canterbury. "The biggest thing I learned in Wales was you have to get the culture right, everybody putting the team first rather than themselves," he says.
Now, he believes perfecting that culture with the All Blacks is the keystone to their pre-eminence. His strength, he reckons, has been "man management" and the creation of a stimulating, humorous environment to accompany the highest professionalism.
"For me, if you've got that fun and stimulation in the right balance, then you'll get a performance every Saturday. This game doesn't have to be serious 24/7. When you train, you train; when you're not, have a bit of banter and a laugh. You need that to take away the tension and pressure because of the incredible expectation level."
Humility remains a prequisite too now that Hansen finds himself being raved about. "I just see it for what it is," he shrugs. "I'm just Steve Hansen, the same Steve Hansen. You've just got to stay humble. I just feel privileged to work alongside some of the world's very best rugby athletes."
His dad helped him stay humble. The hardest time during these two years of glory was when Des Hansen, a coach himself who used to mentor the Marist side in which his lad played at centre, died after a stroke last year.
"When he was coaching, most coaches were 'do it as I say' dictators but Dad challenged us to think 'why did that work? Or how could it work better?' Often, we'd discuss the (All Blacks) game and he wasn't shy about coming forward with his opinion. I know he'd be incredibly proud of what I've achieved."
Yet it may only be the start. Like his dad, Hansen is an innovator, open to ideas to improve a team which this year, he notes proudly, had to overcome "horrendous" injuries, forcing him to use a total of 42 different players.
Yet this year of search and experimentation has strengthened his hand, especially when other things never change, like Richie McCaw's form."He's playing as well as I've ever seen him. He's a machine, a freak," marvels Hansen.
Still, would a nation, and perhaps Hansen himself, consider it a failure should the All Blacks not return here in 2015 and successfully defend the World Cup?
"Some people may well say if we don't win it 'well, Hansen's failed'," he shrugs. "Yet the World Cup is only one task when you're involved with the All Blacks because this is a job where you don't have the luxury of being able to rebuild and lose. You have to win every game.
"If we're as successful in the lead up to the World Cup as we have been this past two years, then you'd look back and reflect 'actually we've done a pretty good job here. We've left All Blacks rugby better than we found it'. That's all I'm striving to do."
He is succeeding spectacularly.
A year in the life of the world’s best coach
Steve Hansen
Born: Mosgiel, New Zealand Age 54
Appointed: December 2011
Previous major head coach jobs: Wales, Canterbury/Crusaders
Overall record: 27 Tests, 25 wins, 1 draw (v Australia), 1 defeat (v England)
Hansen’s All Blacks in 2013: Played 14 Won 14
Opponents: France 4 times, Australia 3, South Africa 2, Argentina 2, England, Ireland, Japan.
Highlights
South Africa 27 New Zealand 38: The All-Blacks’ first win at Ellis Park since 1997 secured the Rugby Championship title in thrilling style.
Ireland 22 N Zealand 24: Perfect winning season seemed over when they conceded 19 unanswered points. But a converted injury-time try saw the All Blacks make history by the skin of their teeth.
47 Comments