Chase Briscoe Shocks Field by Earning Automatic Spot in NASCAR Cup Playoffs with Darlington Win

An amazing 144 points.

That’s the amount Chase Briscoe sat outside the playoff field when he drove into Darlington Raceway for the Cook Out Southern 500, but when the 367-lap race ended he had capitalized on the win-and-you’re-in playoff format.

Throughout the week, Briscoe’s nearly 3-year-old son Brooks constantly told him he needed to beat Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson, and the young boy proved to be prophetic.

Larson dominated the event, leading eight times for 263 laps, before Briscoe shot past him with 30 laps remaining. He then faded to a fourth-place finish, while Busch charged to within 0.361 second of Briscoe before having to settle for second. The finish marked the second time Briscoe had defeated Busch at Darlington. He first accomplished the feat in a NASCAR Xfinity race in 2020.

“I think I just needed him to have maybe three or four more laps older tires for me to be able to break through the (car’s) wake,” Busch said. “Once I got within his air, I really didn’t have enough to power through that, to get closer. I was kind of sliding already.

“Early in the race, I wouldn’t have thought we had a shot. So, felt like we really overachieved towards the end and got a really good finish for what we had or what I thought we had.”

Briscoe led only four times for 29 laps, including the final 26, but his second career victory shook up the playoff field for the second straight week. With 14 drivers qualifying for the playoffs via a victory, only two drivers – Ty Gibbs and Martin Truex Jr. – made it with points. However, even their route to the playoffs appeared sketchy at times during Sunday night’s race.

Truex, who was in by 37 points entering Darlington, crashed on lap 3, while Gibbs, who was 18 points to the good at the race’s start, was involved in a seven-car crash on lap 344. Eventually, Gibbs made the playoffs by 12 points, while Truex knocked out Chris Buescher by six.

Truex admitted his early race exit was a “stupid mistake” on his part that was “inexcusable.”

“It sucks,” Truex said. “We’ve had a miserable two months. Fast cars and nothing to show for it.”

Buescher summed up his emotions after the race as “frustration and disbelief all together.”

“We felt like we did, for the most part, what we needed to do today,” said Buescher, who finished sixth. “We got back in contention there at the end and got a decent finish out of it. We just didn’t quite get it done again and we’re on the outside looking in.”

Also, on the outside looking in by 33 points is Ross Chastain.

“I don’t know if it’s right or wrong, but me, I get out of the car and I watch the 14 (Briscoe) celebrate, and let that sink in and hurt,” said Chastain, who finished fifth. “It is disappointing, and it does hurt. I look down the line and look at the playoff cars, and just take some mental images of that and let that fuel some fire inside of me, inside of our team, and how we keep going, because it does hurt, but a little hurt is good every now and then. Not that I want to be out of the playoffs, but … for Trackhouse and our group we’ll wake up tomorrow, the sun will come up tomorrow ….”

Heartbreaker for Bubba Wallace

It also was a heartbreaker for Bubba Wallace, who earned the pole for the event. He entered the regular season ending race 21 points below the cutline, but there were times during the event that he had a foothold in the playoffs. Then came Wallace’s involvement in a seven-car crash on lap 344 that dashed his hopes of making the playoffs.

“I … got back there in traffic in a spot we hadn’t been all day and got caught up in someone else’s mess,” said Wallace, who finished 16th. “It’s unfortunate. Just wasn’t good enough for 16th (in the playoffs) this year.”

Tyler Reddick, Wallace’s 23XI Racing teammate, said he would talk with Wallace, but he felt like what he would tell him needed to stay between them.

“I’ve been in his spot,” Reddick said. “It’s not fun to be that close and just miss it. At the end of the day, though, there’s just some things you can’t control. I feel like a lot of times this year they’ve been right in the middle of stuff happening on the race track. Call it what you will, but it’s just sometimes how racing can go.”