DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — With a charge from 13th to first in the final two laps, Ryan Blaney won the regular-season finale from the pole position Saturday night at Daytona International Speedway and dashed the hopes of several playoff hopefuls.
The Team Penske driver outdueled a host of desperate drivers in the final 2.5 miles around the World Center of Racing.
The next four drivers in the finishing order all needed to win in order to qualify for the playoffs: Daniel Suarez, Justin Haley, Cole Custer and Erik Jones.
But they all were beaten by the No. 12 Ford of Blaney, who won by 0.031 seconds over Suarez after shooting to the high lane after teaming up with Custer to push toward the front.
“What a wild last couple of laps,” Blaney, who led a race-high 27 of 160 laps, told NBC Sports’ Marty Snider. “I was with Cole on the restart, and he made a good move to get to the top, and I was able to clear him and just barely hold on for the win. Cool night.”
His second win of the season also was a major boost to Blaney’s championship bid. He jumped from fifth to second in the regular-season standings (a gain of four playoff points, plus the five playoff points for the win).
The 15th career victory by the 2023 Cup Series champion was a gift for Alex Bowman, who became the last driver locked into the 16-driver playoff field (along with fellow winless driver Tyler Reddick).
After starting second when qualifying was rained out Friday, Bowman’s chances of making the playoffs dimmed significantly when the Hendrick Motorsports driver was collected in a 12-car wreck on Lap 28
The crash started when Bubba Wallace’s No. 23 Toyota drifted down the track on the frontstretch into the No. 22 Ford of Joey Logano and triggered a chain reaction that caused a 9-minute red flag for cleanup. The wreck ended the win-and-in chances of Kyle Busch, Noah Gragson, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Riley Herbst.
“Yeah, the hit from (Kyle Larson) shoved me down there, and it was like I got shoved up by (Joey Logano) when (Ryan Blaney) moved up,” Wallace told NBC Sports’ Parker Kligerman. “He was trying to just move up and take a lane, but oh well, man. I hate it to go from 22nd to the lead in a short amount of time. Just huge shoutout to my crew on 23 Toyota Camry.
“I hate that. I’ll take the blame for it. Unfortunately, just a crap deal. Everything was going too good too early to be all true. So something was bound to happen. I hate that we were involved in it, but hopefully we can get (Tyler Reddick) in still. So all in all, we’re locked in. Let’s get focused for Darlingnton, and I’m OK.”
With its front end heavily damaged, Bowman’s No. 48 Chevrolet was towed to the garage but was unable to be repaired. The crash left him 35th and took the playoff destiny out of his hands, leaving him rooting for a repeat winner.
“We drove back up there to the back half of the top 10 or whatever and yeah, then just nothing you can do,” Bowman said. “Welcome to superspeedway racing, unfortunately, So really proud of my 48 team for the year up to this point we’ve had. The last 10 or 11 weeks have been pretty special, and yeah, we haven’t won so we’re in a tough spot for the rest of the night, but regardless of the outcome, it’s out of our control and kind of is what it is at this point. So we’ll wait and see how the race ends up and kind of go from there. And regardless, we’re going to be hitting hard the next 10 weeks and trying to get a win, whether we’re in the playoffs or not.”
Meanwhile, the wreck effectively locked Reddick into the playoff field despite an inauspicious start for the 23XI driver.
After a season-worst 34th last week at Richmond prevented him from locking in while putting a dent in his cushion, Reddick’s troubles continued early at Daytona. While exiting Turn 4 on Lap 19, Todd Gilliland’s No. 34 Ford drifted down the banking and into the right front of Reddick’s No. 45 Toyota.
Both cars slid into the infield, and Reddick sustained a heavy front-end impact. His team repaired the damage to keep him on the lead lap, but he restarted outside the top 35.
The crash happened directly in front of Bowman, who averted any contact but was unable to avoid the next multicar wreck.
Stage 1 winner: Larson
Stage 2 winner: Chastain
Next: Sunday, Aug. 31, 6 p.m. ET at Darlington Raceway on USA
