I'm not sure you are fully aware of what you seem to be indicating in this point. Quote from Wikipedia:
"A phylogenetic tree or evolutionary tree is a branching diagram or "tree" showing the evolutionary relationships among various biological species or other entities—their phylogeny (/faɪˈlɒdʒəni/)—based upon similarities and differences
in their physical or genetic characteristics." [emphasis added]
Since there is no genetic information in tiktaalik (because it is allegedly ~380ish ma old), we can rule out genetic characteristics, thus by process of elimination leaving us with just interpretations of physical characteristics. Phylogeny would only utilize genetic data when genetic data is present.
Please read the following article:
Predicting Fossil Finds
Notice what the author states,
"What I hadn’t fully appreciated was that the scientists decided to look where they did based on how old they thought the fossil should be. In other words, they were able to use the theory of evolution to predict where to find the fossil they were looking for."
I did not see any reference to genetics at all, but it was stated scientists found the fossil on the basis of how old they thought the fossil would be. My understanding is that the estimated age assigned to a yet-to-be-found fossil is typically determined by plotting relative to what paleontologists believe are the ages of related precursors and successors to the missing fossil.
I don't believe the find for Tiktaalik was pure blind luck, but that its find was not the result of the reasons/predictions you've been citing. First, many scientists still indicate Tiktaalik was a lobe-finned
fish. So the fact it is found among other fossils of fish and shallow-water tetrapods is not all that startling. Second, as I stated in post #105, the connection of fossils and making them evolutionarily related is the result of inventing a set of antecedent criteria that perceivably makes the relationship true, though cannot be corroborated through actual scientific observation, but only by inference... so there is no credence to the antecedent actually meaning what is otherwise implied to mean.