The Moree curse struck again for Pirates on Saturday with the Bulls scoring in the dying seconds to snatch the points and make it four consecutive wins over the Tamworth side at Weebolla.
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In a frantic finish with Pirates losing two players to the bin in the last five minutes, Jono Spain scored into injury time to level up the game. He then nailed the clutch conversion to kick the Bulls to a 33-31 win.
Bulls president David Watts said it was a "reasonably tough" kick, with Spain lining up the shot from around half-way between the goalposts and the sideline.
The try came on the back of continual pressure on Pirates' line - they were virtually camped there for the last five minutes - and Watts commended the way they kept fighting to the end.
"There were a few moments were we fell asleep; we'd score a try and then let Pirates back in straight away," he said.
"But to play the way we played and battle it out right till the death of it is a true credit to the side."
It was, he said, a very entertaining, physical and see-sawing game.
Conrad Starr gave Pirates the early lead. The Bulls then jumped ahead 19-12 before Pirates worked their way back to a 26-19 lead.
Alex Barker was a standout for the home side, last year's zone best and fairest scoring three tries and proving a constant threat at outside centre.
Watts also singled out replacement hooker Ian Ranger. He came on early in the first half after playing three-quarters of the second grade game.
Making it two-from-two, the win saw the Bulls also wrest the Kookaburra Challenge Cup from Pirates and has, Watts said, given them a confidence boost as they prepare to face last year's grand finalists in the next two weeks.
For Pirates it was another frustrating trip back to Tamworth. But unlike last year when it was their performance that was the source of that frustration, this time it was for other reasons.
As far as the performance goes, co-coach Evan Kellow couldn't really fault them. It was apples and oranges to the first round against Scone.
There was probably a 10 minute period leading into half-time where they switched off a bit, but other than that they executed all of the things they had identified that they needed to address from the Brumbies game.
It was just the last five-ten minutes that made the loss hard to swallow.
"With six, seven minutes to go we were leading by a try and then just the whole sort of tone of the game really changed," Kellow said.
"Things that we'd done for 70 minutes of the game we started getting penalised for, and just back-to-back penalties."
That was what cruelled them - he reckoned there were 15 penalties in-a-row against them in the last seven minutes - compounded by two yellow cards, with Levi Tuicakau binned in the 79th minute and Cooper Hall two minutes later.
In saying that, Kellow said at the end of the day it's "in our own hands to win these close contests".
"Unfortunately we just didn't do it yesterday (Saturday)," he said.
He was proud though of the way they kept turning up.
"I was blown away how long they held on for honestly," he said.
"But sooner or later 15 on 13, it doesn't matter how much you turn up you're going to run out of numbers."
Starr was among their best, Kellow noting that he and five-eighth Jayden Kitchener-Waters were really, "smart around the footy".
Both crossed for doubles as Pirates picked up the bonus point for scoring four tries, as well as finishing within seven.
