Matt Kenseth takes NASCAR victory at New Hampshire

Last week, defending Sprint Cup champ Kevin Harvick said he and his Stewart-Haas Racing team would pound Joe Gibbs Racing and its stable of drivers “into the ground” during the Chase.

Now, two races into the NASCAR’s playoffs, Harvick is in real danger of not advancing into the second round – as JGR continues on its merry way.

Harvick watched helplessly Sunday as JGR’s Matt Kenseth passed his out-of-gas Chevy with two laps left to win the Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.

The victory assured Kenseth a spot in the second round of the Chase, joining teammate Denny Hamlin, who won the Chase opener last week at Chicagoland Speedway. JGR’s Kenseth, Hamlin and Carl Edwards are 1-2-3 in the points standings, as well.

“I’m pretty darned excited to win the race,” said Kenseth. “These are all big races. They’re hard to win. You ever get in a position to win one, you want to do everything in your power to win it, no matter what the consequences.”

It’s the 10th time a JGR driver has won in the past 13 races. Hamlin finished second Sunday and Edwards was fifth. Kyle Busch had the worst day of JGR’s four drivers, finishing 37th after wrecking midway through the race.

As strong as JGR has been in the Chase, so have the playoffs been a near disaster for Harvick so far. Entering the Chase as the fifth seed, he’d been the points leader for much of the season, winning twice and finishing second 10 times.

But things have unraveled in the past two races. In the Chase opener at Chicagoland, Harvick crashed and finished 42nd. He got into a postrace dust-up with Jimmie Johnson, whom Harvick claimed was responsible for a flat tire that caused the wreck.

Then, Sunday, Harvick couldn’t bring the race’s dominant car to victory circle after he ran out of gas with two laps left. He’s 15th in the 16-driver Chase standings, and likely needs to win next week at Dover to be one of the 12 drivers included in the second round. He’s 23 points behind 12th-place Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Harvick, who didn’t talk with the media afterward after leading 216 of the race’s 300 laps, had elected not to pit for fuel and tires during a caution on Lap 239. Harvick was left high and very dry when his car slowed on Lap 298.

Kenseth knew he would need that kind of help to catch Harvick.

“I started pressuring (Harvick) to make sure he burned more fuel,” said Kenseth. “From there on, I pretty much ran as hard as I could every lap and just did everything I could to run (Harvick) down.

Jason Ratcliff, Kenseth’s crew chief, had figured Harvick would probably be too low on gas to make it to the finish.

“You never know what another competitor’s situation is,” said Ratcliff. “But we knew that he possibly couldn’t make it, based on our count. (The crew) told me that he’s probably going to be one or two short.”

On what was mostly another excellent day for JGR, team owner Joe Gibbs still worried about Busch’s team, which was so strong this summer (winning four of five races during one stretch), but is now in danger of not advancing in the Chase out of the 13th spot.

“The sport is kind of crazy,” said Gibbs. “It’s hard to leave the race track when you know you had one car that just had a real tough time, and we care about those guys, too.”

This story was originally published September 27, 2015 at 5:44 PM with the headline "Matt Kenseth takes NASCAR victory at New Hampshire."