The Denver Post

Playoffs begin with 14 drivers chasing Harvick and Hamlin

- By Jenna Fryer

Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin are expected to race head-to-head for the NASCAR Cup title when the 10-week playoff series begin Sunday at Darlington Raceway.

The duo heads to the South Carolina track with a combined 13 regular-season wins between them — they each won a race at Darlington in May when racing resumed during the coronaviru­s pandemic — and they’ve accumulate­d enough playoff points to practicall­y coast into the championsh­ip-deciding finale. That theoretica­lly leaves the 14 other drivers racing for just two spots in the winner-take-all race.

“I met with my team and I told them at the end of this 10 weeks someone will be holding the championsh­ip trophy. Why not us?” said Brad Keselowski. “We can do it just as well as anybody and I’m ready for that challenge.”

The field consists of six former champions including Kyle Busch, the current holder of the Bill France Cup. Busch is a two-time Cup champion but has had a terrible 2020 by his standards and is still seeking his first win of the season.

“Certainly we’re not a title front-runner, we’re not a favorite,” Busch said.

At stake is a winning streak of at least one victory a year since his 2005 rookie season, a source of pride for Busch and one his Joe Gibbs Racing team doesn’t want to end.

“It’s a 16-year investment that we’ve placed on being able to win a race in 16 consecutiv­e seasons, so hopefully we can keep that going,” Busch said.

The field is a mixed lot of experience, with Cole Custer the only rookie to make the playoffs while Matt DiBenedett­o is making his first appearance. NASCAR’s return to racing has been done with COVID-19 protocols that eliminated practice and qualifying, which put younger drivers and smaller teams at a disadvanta­ge.

The playoffs are split into three rounds of three races each, with four drivers eliminated after each round. A victory in any round earns an automatic advancemen­t into the next round until the field is whittled down to four for a Nov. 8 shootout at Phoenix Raceway.

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