Manly produced the third biggest turnaround in premiership history on Sunday to leave Newcastle's NRL finals hopes hanging by a thread.
The Sea Eagles, 72-12 losers to Penrith last week, exorcised their demons against the hapless Knights with a 48-10 victory at Brookvale Oval.
It was the biggest reversal since Parramatta beat Cronulla 74-4 a week after losing 50-12 to Melbourne in 2003 and the Dragons downed New Zealand 54-0 a week after losing 50-4 to North Queensland in 2000.
And it left the Knights' top eight hopes on life support.
Newcastle (9-12 record) almost certainly needs to win its remaining regular season games against finalists the Dragons (home), the Bulldogs (away) and top eight hopefuls the Wests Tigers (home) to be a mathematical finals chance.
"We understood that (they would come back hard) but knowing it and doing something about it is another thing," Knights coach Michael Hagan said.
"We probably had our worst game in six weeks and they had their best day in a long while...we were outplayed all across the park.
"They (Manly) had a bad week then thoroughly enjoyed the day today against us so we've changed places with them in nearly a week."
Hagan said he would have his calculator out as his side attempted a last gasp top eight finish.
"It's definitely not over for us but today's game was extremely important to where we sit (on the NRL table)," he said.
"It's definitely still something for us to play for. We are a little wounded today...but we've got an opportunity to turn things around like Manly did."
Newcastle's task won't be helped by its long injury list which includes forwards Matt Parsons (corked thigh), Josh Perry (hip) and Matt Kennedy, who is out for the season after damaging his knee today.
Depressed Knights skipper Danny Buderus said: "There's no use being in the finals if you are not playing like a top eight side and we're definitely not playing like that at the moment.
"I think everyone was frustrated today. There's no worse feeling when you are on the end of a flogging - there is nowhere to go."
In contrast, Manly skipper Michael Monaghan was soaking up the best win under his short captaincy.
"We sat in the press conference last week and said the good thing about rugby league is that you've only to wait a week to try and turn things around," he said.
"It was a long week but I thought we turned it around well."
Manly coach Des Hasler said: "We've always known this side could play good footy, and in the space of a week to come up with the effort that they did today just speaks volumes about these footballers."
After leading 18-4 at halftime, Manly maintained its dominance when fullback Brett Stewart completed his double in the 44th minute, Monaghan crossed in the 61st and prop Jason King helped himself to a try in the 67th.
Newcastle fullback Robbie O'Davis tried to stem the tide when he crossed in the 70th but the onslaught continued when winger Scott Donald bagged his second in the 74th and forward Kylie Leuluai scored four minutes later.
However, it couldn't satisfy the long suffering Manly fans who started to chant "we want 50" in the final minutes.
