NASCAR: Bubba Wallace’s team has been eliminated
By Asher Fair
Bubba Wallace’s #45 team is no longer in contention to win the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series owner championship following the round of 12.
The round of 12 of the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs came to an end this past Sunday afternoon at the Charlotte Motor Speedway, eliminating four of the 12 remaining playoff drivers and four of the 12 remaining playoff teams from championship contention.
But of the 12 teams that entered the round of 12 still eligible to win the owner title, only 11 had drivers still in the running to win the driver title.
The #45 team was in the round of 12 of the owner playoffs, but its driver, Bubba Wallace, was not a playoff driver after finishing in 20th place in the regular season point standings without a win.
The #45 team qualified for the playoffs thanks to Kurt Busch’s win behind the wheel of the #45 Toyota at Kansas Speedway back in May.
But when Busch withdrew from the playoffs as a result of the concussion-like symptoms he had been suffering after his qualifying crash at Pocono Raceway in July, that only opened up a spot in the driver playoffs, not the owner playoffs.
So while Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney inherited Busch’s playoff spot as the highest finishing non-winner in the regular season point standings, his #12 team was left out of the owner playoffs and locked into a 10-week battle for 17th place.
23XI Racing made the decision to move Wallace from his regular #23 Toyota to Busch’s #45 Toyota in an attempt to bolster the #45 team’s chances at the owner championship.
In the round of 16, Wallace won at Kansas Speedway to lock the #45 team into the round of 12, but he could not do enough to lock it into the round of 8.
However, because Blaney advanced to the round of 8, there is still a round of 8 owner spot that is occupied by a team whose driver has already been eliminated.
That spot is occupied by the #5 Hendrick Motorsports team, whose driver Kyle Larson was one of the four drivers who failed to make it out of the round of 12.
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The round of 8 is scheduled to begin this Sunday, October 16 with the South Point 400, which is set to be broadcast live on NBC from Las Vegas Motor Speedway beginning at 2:30 p.m. ET. If you haven’t already done so, be sure to start a free trial of FuboTV today!