A fighting 75 from South Australian teenager Travis Head and a late cameo from Dan Christian have the Redbacks in with a chance of ending a horror Sheffield Shield run against Tasmania at Bellerive.
Eighteen-year-old Head made the most of a life when he was 17 to crack his third Shield half-century, and first of the season, off 108 balls with 10 fours.
Australian one-day allrounder Dan Christian then smacked 50 off just 59 balls to help the Redbacks to a handy lead of 199 after they had bowled the Tigers out for a first innings 138 earlier on day two.
South Australia have not taken outright points in a Shield match since November 2010, but that was against Tasmania at Bellerive.
At stumps, the Redbacks were 7-225 in their second innings with skipper Johan Botha unbeaten on 17 and Chadd Sayers six.
Tigers seamer Jackson Bird had figures of 3-48 with Ben Hilfenhaus(1-80), Luke Butterworth(1-39), James Faulkner (1-47) and Xavier Doherty (1-8) taking a wicket apiece.
It proved a frustrating day at the office for Test paceman Hilfenhaus, who had to take a catch off his bowling himself to get a wicket after two simple chances had been dropped.
The big swing bowler made no mistake in getting underneath a miscue from Christian at 7-213 after catches were grassed by Ed Cowan at gully and Mark Cosgrove in the slips.
After making just 112 in their first dig, the Redbacks had looked to be in trouble again at 3-31 but a 118-run fourth-wicket partnership between Callum Ferguson (41) and Head steadied the ship.
They lost that pair and Tim Ludeman (0) within the space of one run to slide from 3-149 to 6-150 before a 63-run seventh-wicket stand between Christian and skipper Botha averted disaster again.
Earlier in the day, South Australian paceman Sayers had finished with 4-29 and Christian 3-31 as the Redbacks took 7-75 to have the Tigers all out with a modest lead of 26 on the first innings.
Ex-Queenslander Ben Dunk top-scored with 45 in his first Shield outing for Tasmania.
Test spinner Nathan Lyon didn’t ball a ball in the Tasmanian innings with the green-tinged pitch and cool conditions favouring the seamers.
Steve Cazzulino was called in by the Tigers to replace Ricky Ponting, who was withdrawn from the game with hamstring soreness.
