The setting was familiar: a black tie function, men and women dressed in finery, a three-course meal, speeches and a vote count.

Then, the season's best Australian Rules footballer was announced by the AFL's chief executive. And the best player, on this unprecedented night, was a she.

She was Erin Phillips.

And as of last Saturday, she was not merely an Australian Olympian but an Adelaide Crows premiership player.

When AFL boss Gillon McLachlan declared on Tuesday, that 14 votes from umpires made Phillips peerless in the eight-week inaugural AFL women's season, the winning footballer smiled. She then kissed her wife on the lips.

Within a minute, Phillips was sharing the joy with the audience which included out-going AFL Commission head, Mike Fitzpatrick who - when he raised the toast to Phillips - remarked, rightly: "well, this is a new experience".

Phillips thanked the AFL for starting the AFL women's league three years earlier than originally planned.

She spoke about the four-and-a-half-month-old twins that her American wife, Tracy, carried and has also breast-fed through this convention-smashing inaugural AFLW season.

"I'm just unbelievably honoured," she said.

These were the first words Phillips said after having a medal - the as-yet-unnamed highest individual AFL accolade for a female player - put around her neck.

Phillips polled three votes in each of the Crows' first two games in the AFLW - best afield against Greater Western Sydney and the Western Bulldogs, well before anyone knew she would go on to be best on ground in last Saturday's landmark grand final.

"As soon as I was born I wanted to play footy. My poor father, I never let him sit down," the hard-bodied, deftly-skilled athlete reflected.

Phillips's father is Greg Phillips, a South Australian football champion who now, with wife Julie, is helping Erin and her wife, Tracy, with their twins, Brooklyn and Blake.

Erin and Tracy - married in America - have recently moved back into the Phillips' family nest for the extra support as one of the twins' mum has dominated the first AFLW season in the first AFLW premiership side.

"Every bit of this is owed to you," 31-year-old Phillips said to her wife on the stage.

"I love you and thank you so much."

What has playing AFLW meant to Phillips, who played basketball for Australia at the Beijing Olympics and, in a fortnight, returns to America with brood to play in the WNBA for Dallas?

"It has meant everything," she said.

"I was 13 years old and I was told I wasn't allowed to play footy any more with the boys. So to have this 17 years later; it's alright."

She was so much better than alright. She helped light the AFLW up.