Friendship made all the difference for five Colorado state senators in last fall’s election.

This week NBC News profiled the friendship of the “fab five,” as they’ve been dubbed – a quintet of state senators who supported each other through a sometimes turbulent election season and came out on top: Democratic Sens. Kerry Donovan, Jessie Danielson, Faith Winter, Tammy Story and Brittany Pettersen.

WATCH the video at the bottom of the story.

The five were friends long before the election – for nearly a decade, in fact, they told the network.

“We knew that the success of one of us depended on the success of all of us making it into the Senate,” said Donovan in the clip, surrounded by the other four under the Capitol’s golden dome.

“And we made it.”

“These were some of the closest races in the entire country,” Danielson added.

Pettersen said the five formed a text group and “immediately reached out” when they became targets of negative campaign ads.

“It’s a deep relationship with what we’ve gone through together,” she said. 

As for Winter’s coming forward with sexual harassment allegations against a fellow lawmaker in 2017 – Pettersen was her first call after, she said.

“You need that support network,” Winter said. “You need those friends. You need that friendship. … When we’re down here during session, when we’re working 70, 80 hours a week – you don’t want a life without friends.”