RICHMOND, Va. — The field of 10 is set.
The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series playoff field was finalized Saturday evening at Richmond Raceway, as Taylor Gray, Ben Rhodes and Daniel Dye took the final three spots.
All things considered, the 250-lapper went smooth sailing for Gray. He ran inside the top 10 for nearly the entire night, finishing second in the opening stage and coming home third. Gray officially locked into the postseason after finishing ninth in Stage Two and ultimately advanced by 63 points.
“I can’t thank all of my TRICON guys enough and Jeff Hensley (crew chief) on top of the box bringing me a really fast JBL Toyota Tundra TRD Pro,” Gray said. “I think I kind of ruined our chances of winning the race on that one restart where I fell back to 10th or so and it kind of just snowballed from there. We got into the wall on the backstretch and got a little bit of a fender on the right front and it just caused us to get super tight there.
“We’ve struggled the last couple weeks so to go out and run third and content for a win is definitely a confident booster going into the last seven.”
Ben Rhodes secured one of the remaining spots by virtue of his seventh-place finish. He brought home results of fourth and sixth in the stages after starting 13th.
The reigning series victor is hoping that like in other championship seasons, he can heat up when it counts the most. Rhodes is in pursuit of his third title in four years.
“I was pretty relaxed going into this race,” Rhodes said. “I’m happy with the overall performance for the night. It was a step in the right direction for this Nashville Stampede Ford F-150 team, but we still have to improve. We still have to get better. Now that it’s reset, we kind of get to take it one race at a time.
“Our story over the years has been that we always find a way even when things are going right or things aren’t going well. Whether we’re the underdog or the odd man out, we always find a way and typically that’s just not letting any pressure situations get to us and let other people do their thing and it seems to work out, so I’m hoping that can work again for us this year as well.”
While both Gray and Rhodes came into the regular-season finale with a cushion, Daniel Dye did not. He entered Saturday’s race at Richmond five points below Tanner Gray and was in need of a strong night to advance.
Finishing eighth and scoring points in both stages, that’s exactly what happened. Dye’s dash into the playoffs — which included a runner-up at Nashville (Tenn.) Superspeedway — was the first time a driver below the cutline entering the regular-season finale made it in. He advanced by 12 markers over the elder Gray brother.
Tanner struggled on Saturday, finishing 12th. Ultimately though, he chalked up the missed opportunity big picture, as he’s scored just four top 10s to this point.
“We just weren’t good enough. All day, we just didn’t have the speed – didn’t have the balance,” Tanner Gray said. “I didn’t do a good enough job. Really frustrated. I don’t know. You come into a race where you’re on the cut like this – you have to better, and we weren’t tonight.
“Congrats to Daniel (Dye). They were better, and they were better down the stretch when it mattered. We just made too many mistakes overall throughout the season – too sloppy, so we have to clean it up. I have got to clean up things on my end, and we just need to be better.”
Stewart Friesen, who entered at 16 points below the cutline, never came within striking distance. He ran in the mid-teens for most of the afternoon before slowing on the track with an issue on lap 224. He finished 25th.
Matt Crafton failed to qualify for the playoffs for the first time in his career.