New Zealand's women's sevens team experienced a rare slump last season, but are clicking again under their new coach.

Former assistant coach Allan Bunting took over the side last November after Sean Horan, who led the team to three straight Women's World Rugby Sevens series titles, stepped down following a season where the title and the Rio Games gold medals both headed to archrivals Australia.

And the Black Ferns are quickly back to their familiar place atop the standings, winning three of the four events this season.

Star wing Portia Woodman -- the all-time top try scorer in the series -- was quick to praise Bunting.

"He's kind of allowed us to play our own game...he pretty much allowed us to coach ourselves, he leaves it up to players to take control," she told Kyodo News over the weekend when the New Zealanders won the Kitakyushu Sevens, the first time a leg of the series had been held in Japan.

"In the past we were quite structured...the structure worked for the first four years," she added. "But sports are beyond that too. We've been able to adapt and change the way we play, and (he made us feel) there's no mistake in the decisions we make -- whether it works or not."

The 2015-16 season saw New Zealand end the campaign without a single title in the series before the misery was compounded by a 24-17 Olympic final defeat in Brazil. But they exacted revenge over their neighbors at the earliest opportunity, winning 17-5 in Dubai in December in this series' first final.

Another title in Las Vegas followed in early March and the coach himself is feeling the team is heading in the right direction.

"The players are really enjoying the style of rugby that we're playing, and that's really important," said Bunting, who spent three years playing with Tokyo Gas in the second tier of Japan's corporate rugby set-up through 2009. "We've changed our style a bit, we're using space pretty well."

"We now have a player-leading environment. Players lead lots of the stuff on and off the field so now the leaders are growing really well. On the field they don't have coaches, they just have players so we want them making their own decisions under pressure. They're starting to do it really well."

Bunting's side won all three pool stage games in Kitakyushu including a last-minute 19-14 turnaround against France -- where their sustained period of pressure left the Europeans out of gas in the closing stages.

They brushed aside England and Fiji before they found themselves on the brink of defeat against Canada in the final. But they sent out another message that they do not go down easily by scoring two late tries -- the first by Woodman who ran almost the full length of the pitch.

"I didn't think I was able to (get there) because I saw three players coming. I thought I was going to get tackled, but I saw (the last player) slow down so I just kept going," Woodman said with a smile.

If her try was pure class, the second epitomized what the team has been working on -- interchanges on the left created a huge hole for Michaela Blyde to exploit on the opposite side, much to the delight of the coach.

"Through the tournament, we didn't play the spaces as well as we wanted to and that's why we struggled a bit. But in the final when we got the ball, I think we did. You see the last try, space to space," said Bunting.

"We've got a new management, a new group of girls and we're just starting afresh," said Woodman. "The girls just want to play as much as they can, have fun playing, and they have the opportunity to do whatever they want. The rest of us will be there to support them, we'll back them up."

"We've learned from the last few years and from the Olympics, and we know we don't want to feel like that again so we are just working to get better."