The Sky Blues stunned the second-place Mariners with a 2-0 victory in front of 16,155 fans at Allianz Stadium while the Roar and Victory could not be separated after 90 minutes in from 12,624 at Suncorp Stadium.
The results on Saturday night leave the Mariners in second but two points behind the top-of-the-table Western Sydney Wanders who are still to play the bottom-place Wellington Phoenix at home on Sunday with a chance to extend their lead on top to five points.
The Victory remain third with their draw with the Roar that leaves the two-time defending A-League champions out of the top-six in seventh spot remaining a point behind the Newcastle Jets.
Sydney jumped ahead of Perth Glory, Brisbane and Newcastle with the impressive victory to now sit in fifth spot with three games of their season remaining.
The Sky Blues scored a goal in either half at home to the Mariners with Seb Ryall scoring in the 26th minute and then Joel Chianese in the 73rd to continue Central Coast's tough run of late following on from last week's loss to the Wanderers.
The win was Sydney's sixth in-a-row at its home base of Allianz Stadium but coach Frank Farina knows there is plenty of work still to do.
"We've got three games left and we need at least another three or six points from them if we want to make the finals," Farina said.
"We got two goals but the key to tonight was our defence. I thought the back four played very well, that was our strength tonight."
The Mariners have now lost consecutive games for the first time this season and coach Graham Arnold feels the Wanderers have all but sewn up top spot.
"I think the Premiers' Plate is nearly gone to be honest. The Western Sydney Wanderers have got two hands on it now especially if they win tomorrow," Arnold said.
"They'll be excited by our result tonight and there might be a few who don't sleep well tonight for them. But with that type of crowd behind them, the pressure is on them to win tomorrow."
The Victory got off to a fast start against the Roar in Brisbane when Leigh Broxham scored just 11 minutes in, but the home side steadied from there and created a host of good scoring chances.
Eventually, Ivan Franjic found the back of the net in the 59th minute to level scores at 1-1, and that's where they stayed.
Roar coach Mike Mulvey was happy with how his team performed and even though three points was obviously the preferred option, he will gladly take the one out of the game.
"I'm very happy with the way we played the game. To be fair, though, we could have been out of sight and buried in the first half because Michael (Theo) made some fantastic saves," Mulvey said.
"I was disappointed with the goal we conceded because we switched off and you can't do that against a team like Melbourne. The smallest guy on the field scored a header against us, but the response in the second half was fantastic.
"I'm delighted with the performance and a point is good, but we would have liked three."
Victory coach Ange Postecoglou continues to be pleased with the form of his team and it is all geared to be peaking come finals time.
"A draw is probably a fair result. We were pretty good tonight in executing our plan and most of their chances we kept from outside the box, and we had some really good clear cut ones ourselves. We needed a second goal and didn’t get it," Postecoglou said.
"Form is the key thing in this competition and our last two weeks have been good. We were great last week and this week against a tough, determined opponent we were good again to pick up a point away from home.
"This is the sort of performance we want leading into the finals and the thing we know is we will be playing finals, and will have at least one home final. We want to be absolutely flying when that comes around and that's the premise we will be working on for the next three weeks."