KANSAS CITY – The flashbacks hit Aaron Judge as he strode through Kauffman Stadium’s visiting dugout during this American League Division Series, reminders of the hollowness that he and his teammates experienced on those same grounds 12 months ago.

They had been in a glum daze as they scanned the infield dirt for a few extra beats while their season ended, relegated to outsiders while baseball’s best teams were advancing to more important games. They’ve resolved to never experience that again.

“All day, I was just thinking about our season ending here in ’23,” Judge said on Thursday. “No playoffs, that stung. A lot of guys stuck around, staring at the field, a lot of what-ifs. What could we have done here?”

We have some of those answers now. After 94 wins in the regular season, the Yankees are eight wins shy of their ultimate goal, as Judge secured the final out of a 3-1 victory over the Royals in Game 4 of the American League Division Series.

Juan Soto, Gleyber Torres and Giancarlo Stanton all drove in runs to support Gerrit Cole’s strong seven-inning effort as the Yankees advanced to their 19th ALCS all-time, and their third in Aaron Boone’s managerial tenure.

“We played a really good-looking brand of baseball in this series,” Boone said. “Even though we didn’t score a ton of runs, I felt like we had a lot of tough, heavy at-bats that we like to have. Hopefully we break through with some more runs next series.”

Preparing to host either the Guardians or Tigers in a best-of-seven showdown set to begin Oct. 14 at Yankee Stadium, this squad believes it has all the necessary ingredients to advance to the franchise’s first World Series since 2009.

“We’re fired up,” Cole said. “I had a couple of IPAs with the boys and sprayed some champagne. This is the greatest.”

As Cole popped bottles and sprayed lagers to a techno soundtrack, others on the roster reflected upon the journey of the preceding calendar year, beginning with that season-ending loss to the Royals last Oct. 1.

“We talked about that today; they ended our season last year and it left a sour taste in our mouths,” said shortstop Anthony Volpe. “Probably the same way they were sitting in their dugout watching us, that’s what we were doing last year.”

The offseason had been too long for many Bombers; when Judge resumed workouts in January at the club’s Tampa, Fla. player development complex, he was thrilled that many teammates reported weeks early to join him.

“Guys went out, put in the work,” Judge said. “To have our season moving on here, it’s pretty awesome.”