However, their destination remained up in the air until the final match of the round when Brisbane met the Manly Sea Eagles. A 24 point win would have given the Broncos a home playoff match, and a 33 point win would have seen that match be against the Warriors.
The Broncos' 48-16 win saw them jump to sixth on the ladder, confirming the Warriors' trip to Sydney.
The Warriors were unable to watch the Broncos match to learn their fate as they attended their club awards night. Coach Stephen Kearney said he wasn't tempted to look at the live updates during the night.
"Whatever was going to happen was going to happen so there was no point me riding every minute.
"As it's turned out we'll play Penrith on Saturday night and that's what we'll prepare for.
"As everyone keeps mentioning, it's a different competition now. So we're going to park what we've achieved in the last 25 weeks to the side and take some good stuff out of it. But we'll approach this week as we have almost every other and that's by preparing well to play well against Penrith."
This season, match-up between the Warriors and Panthers have been crowd-pleasers, with 92 points scored in 160 minutes of football.
The sides split their season series with a win each, both winning on home soil.
While the Panthers earned hosting rights for the opening round of the playoffs, they won't be playing in their home stadium at the foot of the mountains. The match will be held at ANZ Stadium on Saturday, with kick off set for 7:30pm NZT – the same time as the All Blacks match against Argentina in Nelson gets underway.
Round one of the NRL playoffs (all times NZT)
Melbourne Storm v South Sydney Rabbitohs. AAMI Park Melbourne. 9:40pm Friday September 7
Penrith Panthers v NZ Warriors. ANZ Stadium, Sydney. 7:30pm Saturday September 8
Sydney Roosters v Cronulla Sharks. Allianz Stadium, Sydney. 9:40pm Saturday September 8
Brisbane Broncos v St. George Illawarra Dragons. Suncorp Stadium, Brisbane. 6:00pm Sunday September 9
- Additional reporting by David Skipwith
