WASPS' untimely and increasingly damaging run of losses reached six games this afternoon as they capsised at Welford Road.
They were beaten five tries to one in a match that was more one-sided than the scoreline suggests, and means they must now go back to Gloucester on February 17 for their last victory.
They were fourth after edging past the Cherry and Whites nearly two months ago, but since then they have been knocked over by London Irish, Worcester, Northampton, Saracens and now Leicester in a crushing sequence that has sent them spiralling down to eighth.
It's not critical to Wasps' top six hopes yet though.
Next weekend's home game with Exeter and a final day trip to the now-safe Sale offer realistic lifelines, and while today's reverse was emphatic, it shouldn't be over-emphasised.
Wasps never get anything at Leicester and they didn't expect to this weekend, resting half the team that took on Leinster in the Amlin Challenge Cup quarter final and leaving plenty more of their big names at home.
Joe Launchbury, James Haskell, T Rhys Thomas, Stephen Jones, Sam Jones, Andrea Masi and Marco Wentzel were all omitted completely, either injured or rested, Joe Simpson only started on the bench while Christian Wade and Nick Robinson both came off at the first sign of trouble with less than half an hour played.
Wasps would probably have lost even with that sort of talent on the pitch, but without it they were lame ducks and Leicester were taking pot shots at will from the first whistle.
Three penalties in front of the posts inside the first 18 minutes revealed that dominance.
Toby Flood knocked over two of them to ease the home team ahead before tries from Ben Youngs and Graham Kitchener after 20 and 25 minutes stretched the lead out to 16-0.
Niall Morris and Adam Thompstone would also have gone over but for magnificent tackles from James Cannon and Tom Varndell, before Leicester did add try number three when Rob Hawkins drove over from close range after 36 minutes.
Had Flood not wasted nine points off the tee Leicester's control on the scoreboard would have more closely resembled their control on the pitch, but the England fly half was having an off day and with Tommy Bell taking both his chances with the boot Wasps reached the interval just 21-6 down.
It wasn't as close as that though, and within minutes of the restart Wasps were on the back foot again.
First Bell was yellow-carded for a deliberate knock on in front of his posts and a minute later Youngs sniped over for his second try of the day.
This time Flood did convert to make it 28-6 and after Elliot Daly replied with another booming penalty Thompstone flew down the line for Tigers' fifth score.
That eased them out to 35-9, and with a quarter of the game remaining Wasps were starting to feel the claws of a Tigers' mauling.
To their credit though, they didn't capitulate.
With their entire bench on and Leicester, in contrast, withdrawing a few of their leading lights, the away team finally began to make some inroads and they got their reward when Daly took over from Wade to score their now customary wonder try.
The full back closed the door on last week's errors against Leinster as he cut a superb line inside Leicester's wide defence to race over with 63 minutes played.
And the score would have been even more respectable had Charlie Hayter found Tom Varndell when Wasps broke down the left with a two-man overlap.
They blew that chance, but it came in a gritty finish from Dai Young's men that means all is not quite lost.
A 50-point hammering would have done them no good; but a patched up team escaping Welford Road with a 35-16 loss means the ship is still afloat ahead of what could be a European showdown with Exeter in their final home match of the season next weekend.
