South Korea international Son Heung-min's double fired Bayer Leverkusen to a 3-0 win at Paderborn and up into fourth in the Bundesliga on Sunday.
Bayer’s goalkeeper Bernd Leno was kept busy in the first half, before Greek defender Kyriakos Papadopoulos broke the deadlock in the 72nd minute.
Son then extended Bayer’s lead with six minutes left, doubling up in the third minute of stoppage time.
Bayer’s reward was to deprive Schalke of fourth spot – Roger Schmidt’s side are now only two points behind third-placed Borussia Monchengladbach.
Bayer found out after their match that they had been drawn against Bayern Munich in the DFB-Pokal (German Cup) quarter-finals next month.
Sunday’s earlier game saw Cologne end a near four-month winless run at home with a 4-2 defeat of Eintracht Frankfurt.
Cologne’s 600th Bundesliga success moved them up to 28 points, five clear of the relegation zone.
A double from attacking midfielder Alexander Meier for Frankfurt left him at the top of the Bundesliga scoring charts with 18 goals.
Deyverson’s first Bundesliga goal got Cologne on their way to victory, but Meier levelled for the visitors.
Thomas Schaaf’s men wasted chances to take the lead and were then punished as Marcel Risse, Yuya Osako and Anthony Ujah netted in quick succession to earn the promoted club all three points, taking them up to 11th.
Meier added a second for Frankfurt in stoppage time from the penalty spot after Kevin Wimmer was sent off.
On Saturday, Bayern Munich moved 11 points clear at the top with Thomas Muller scoring twice in their 3-1 comeback win at Hannover as nearest challengers Wolfsburg lost 1-0 at Augsburg.
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