Preston boss Alan Irvine admitted a few "moments of madness" cost his side precious points in their play-off bid following a 2-1 defeat at Crystal Palace.
Palace halted their slide down the Coca-Cola Championship table after a quickfire first-half double from Anthony Stokes and Neil Danns cancelled out Billy Jones' 29th-minute opener.
And Irvine now expects the Championship promotion race to go to the wire, he said: "It will go down to the final day, at the top and bottom of the table."
He added: "There's nothing between the sides at the top and bottom so the funny results in this league don't surprise me.
"I thought a few weeks ago that it would need to be a very high total - maybe 75 - to get in the play-offs but now I'm not so sure.
"Teams are dropping points so it might be lower than that now. Our home form is good but we will need to start picking up points on the road as well."
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