The sequential break-up of Gondwana is thought to be a dominant process in the establishment of shared biota across landmasses of the Southern Hemisphere. Yet similar distributions are shared by taxa whose radiations clearly post-date the Gondwanan break-up. Thus, determining the contribution of vicariance versus dispersal to seemingly Gondwanan biota is complex. The southern freshwater crayfishes (family Parastacidae) are distributed on Australia and New Guinea, South America, Madagascar and New Zealand and are unlikely to have dispersed via oceans, owing to strict freshwater limitations. We test the hypotheses that the break-up of Gondwana has led to (1) a predominately east–west (((Australia, New Zealand: 80 Ma) Madagascar: 160–121 Ma) South America: 165–140 Ma), or (2) a southern (((Australia, South America: 52–35 Ma) New Zealand: 80 Ma) Madagascar: 160–121 Ma) pattern for parastacid crayfish. Further, we examine the evidence for a complete drowning of New Zealand and subsequent colonization by freshwater crayfish.