The Crows rediscovered the intensity that had been lacking against Port Adelaide and Richmond over the past two weeks and trailed by just six points at half time.
But the scoring dried up as the rain set in early in the third term, with just three goals kicked in the second half.
Adelaide has played in several wet-weather encounters this season, including one against the Tigers as recently as last weekend.
Craig admitted he thought this experience would be an advantage against the Dogs, who play their home games under the roof of Etihad Stadium, but said the Crows had been guilt of overusing the handball in the second half.
“Surprisingly, I thought the Bulldogs actually handled the wet a bit better than us,” Craig said.
“I thought if it did come in wet that we would be better adapted to that than they were, but I thought they were a bit better than us in moving the ball forward.
“We still tried to use too much handball, which is obviously fairly ingrained in us, but I thought that was the biggest difference in the end.”
Inaccurate goalkicking again proved costly for the Crows in the opening term, but this was negated by the Bulldogs’ inaccuracy in the second quarter.
Adelaide was in the contest right until the final siren and Craig said he could take “some joy” from the team’s effort.
“If we continue to play with that sort of effort we’ll win some games of footy, but we need to reproduce that effort regardless of the profile of our squad,” Craig said.
“Today we got our intensity back - that competitive intensity that I thought had dropped off a bit over the last couple of weeks. We need to try and keep that at a high standard.”
The Crows are now officially out of the finals race and will use the next three weeks as preparation for next season.
Craig said that preparation was likely to include a look at comeback kid Trent Hentschel, who has managed just three games this year and is out of contract at the end of the season.
“Trent played in the SANFL yesterday. I saw the first quarter and a half and his speed looked good to me. If he can put another one or two of those [performances] together I’d be keen to have a look at him at AFL level because that [his future] is a big decision for him and for us as well,” Craig said.
Wingman Brodie Martin got through his first game in 12 months unscathed and is likely to hold his place in the side, with veterans Simon Goodwin (ankle) and Andrew McLeod (knee) expected to miss another week.
Craig said McLeod had suffered a “little setback” and was less likely to play against the Brisbane Lions at the Gabba next week than Goodwin.
