NSW humiliated South Australia in the first session on Saturday to be on the verge of a dominant Sheffield Shield victory at the SCG.
The Blues are 1-31, requiring just 60 more runs for an outright victory which has well and truly been set up by brilliant performances from their bowling corps.
Resuming at 4-93 on the morning of day three, the Redbacks folded to be all out for 127 well before lunch.
In nine overs before the break, NSW made serious headway into the small target with David Dawson (12) and Daniel Hughes (7) unbeaten.
The only blow suffered by the Blues all morning came in the form of a cheap dismissal of opener Scott Henry, who was caught behind off Chadd Sayers (1-16) for nine.
Remarkably, a win would open the door for the last-placed Blues to reach next week’s Shield final.
A successful chase will earn NSW the maximum six points, lifting them to 29 points and putting them in a position to even host the final – depending on results from the two other Shield games in play around the country.
Just as they did in the first innings, fast-bowling duo Gurinder Sandhu and Josh Hazlewood made a mockery of South Australia’s battling stocks.
Sandhu, who claimed four victims in the first innings as SA collapsed to be all out for 182, struck with the third ball of the day to dismiss Jake Brown (21) and had Tim Ludeman out lbw in his second over to finish with 3-20.
By the time Hazlewood (3-35) added the wicket of Johan Botha (4), and former Test paceman Trent Copeland knocked back the off stump of Sayers (0) the batting capitulation had set in.
Fringe Australian batsman Callum Ferguson played a lone hand as the visitors fought for their season, hitting eight boundaries in his unbeaten 44.
But he had precious little support.