Proteas captain Temba Bavuma holds aloft the series trophy after defeating Australia 2-1 at Newlands on Saturday.

Image: AFP

Captain Temba Bavuma believes "the sky is the limit" for his world No. 1-ranked Proteas Test side after their 176-run victory over Australia sealed a monumental 2-1 series triumph at Newlands on Saturday.

Bavuma joined Faf du Plessis as the only Proteas captains to lead their respective teams to a series victory over Australia on home soil since readmission. It also catapulted the Proteas to the summit of the ICC rankings, a position they have not held since January 2016.

While the final day may have come to a brisk end, rather than the cliffhanger many had hoped for, the Proteas were pushed to the very limits of their physical and mental fortitude on each day of the series.

Bavuma takes great pride in the fact that his team were able to absorb all that pressure and still find a way to grind out the result.

"I think this will be remembered as one of the iconic Test series, at least in this century, I'd like to believe. Two quality sides who came up against each other and really forced each other to play their best cricket," he said.

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"I think it'll be important for us to acknowledge what we've achieved, really bask in what we've achieved. I think for me, it's really soaking all of it in. I think coming into this series, we were tested from all angles every day. We were under pressure.

"If I think before the series against Australia, if we were given the favourite tag, I'm not too sure about that. But I do hope with the way that we perform, not the result, but the way that we performed, it's given that belief.

"And I guess in a cheeky way, we answered certain critics, saying that, you know, what we did at the WTC final was no fluke. So, yeah, sky's the limit for the team."

Much of the Proteas' resolve stems from their skipper, Bavuma. It was particularly significant in the second Test at Gqeberha, when the Proteas were 40/4 and the series hanging on a knife edge, that Bavuma delivered a career-best 179 that ultimately turned the tide.

At Newlands, it was the less experienced batters, such as Ryan Rickelton and Wiaan Mulder, who took up the baton from their captain with centuries of their own before Simon Harmer completed the job with the ball.

Bavuma takes great pride in the fact that his players have embraced similar traits of defiance.

"I guess you always want to leave a little bit of yourself within the team. And I guess resilience is a word that we speak about as a South African Proteas team," he said.

"I think resilience is something that features massively within my own career as a cricketer.

"I mean, you wake up every day asking yourself to be at your best. Physically, there are times when you feel like you can't go at 100%, but you kind of need to dig deep. And if the opportunity is there, make sure you're in the best mental space to make the play for the team.

"And even if things don't go well for you with the ball or the bat, you still need to be looking at ways you can contribute within the team. So I think all of us will take a lot from the series. It was 15 days of just pressure.

"Yeah, and I think as a team, we can only really get better from this type of experience."

The Proteas will now enjoy a well-deserved break before locking horns with Bangladesh in a two-match series starting on November 15 at the Wanderers.