Western Australia have booked a third straight home Sheffield Shield final after defeating a wounded Victoria and leapfrogging Tasmania to top spot on the ladder.
The dual defending champions needed everything to go right in their last regular-season game to keep alive their hopes of a Shield three-peat.
WA rose to the challenge, defeating the Vics by 138 runs in a virtual elimination final at the Junction Oval in Melbourne.
Set 269 to win, the Vics were skittled for 130 late on a rain-affected day three of the match.
WA finished the campaign on 47.93 points, pipping Tasmania (47.36) in a nail-biting final round.
Victoria never looked like pulling off the unlikely run chase on a difficult pitch, stumbling to 3-31 with their three most experienced batters - Nic Maddinson, Marcus Harris and Peter Handscomb - already dismissed.
Young left-hander Campbell Kellaway showed why he has a bright future, hitting 53 from 136 balls for his fifth first-class half-century.
After coming in at No.3, Kellaway survived the carnage around him as WA's bowlers worked in tandem to complete the match on Wednesday.
Spinner Corey Rocchiccioli (2-26) tore through the lower order to be on a hat-trick after dismissing Fergus O'Neill and Todd Murphy in consecutive balls.
Liam Haskett (3-12) finished with the best figures of his first-class career and ended the match after Kellaway was caught going for a slog pull shot.
Victoria captain Will Sutherland almost broke down when describing the pain of the defeat.
"Our batting let us down ... the boys ran out of steam a little bit with the ball," he said.
"We're still a young group, but I think this one does hurt quite a bit ... almost hurts more than making the final and losing, I don't know why."
Sutherland (back), Test quick Scott Boland (knee) and O'Neill (illness) all struggled through the match.
WA will host the five-day final against Tasmania at the WACA Ground, starting on March 21, after the Tigers blew a golden opportunity to ensure the decider was played in Hobart.
Tasmania started the round in the box seat to secure a home final, only needing to defeat South Australia at Blundstone Arena to lock it in.
But the Tigers suffered a shock 134-run loss - just their second defeat of the season - against the Redbacks to consign them to a trip to Perth.
WA are aiming to become just the third team this century, after Queensland (2000-02) and Victoria (2015-17), to win three straight Shield titles.
"The pleasing thing about this group is there's no real talk about three in a row," WA captain Sam Whiteman said.
"It's just about winning this year, and we've found this year that Shields are so hard to win, a lot of things need to go your way."
