The 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season is set to come to a conclusion this Sunday afternoon at Phoenix Raceway, where Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe and Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson and William Byron are set to battle for a championship.
Sunday's race is scheduled to be a 312-lap race around the four-turn, 1.022-mile (1.645-kilometer) oval in Avondale, Arizona, and it is set to be shown live on NBC.
NBC will have aired three consecutive races to close out the season after showing just one out of the first 11 following the switch from TNT Sports in early August.
NASCAR Phoenix finale not being shown on USA
The first three races after the switch from TNT Sports to NBC were shown live on USA Network, which replaced NBC Sports in 2022 as the NBCUniversal-owned cable network used during NBC's portion of the broadcast schedule after NBC Sports Network shut down at the end of 2021.
NBC itself didn't actually show a race live this year until the regular season finale at Daytona International Speedway in late August, and then after that, USA Network opened up the playoffs by showing seven consecutive races, meaning that NBC was again left without any Cup Series action for nearly two months.
The race at Talladega Superspeedway two weekends ago was the first race shown on NBC since the Daytona regular season finale, and it kicked off a stretch off three straight races on NBC to conclude the 2025 season. This past weekend's race at Martinsville Speedway was shown live on NBC, and this weekend's season finale at Phoenix is set to be shown live on NBC as well.
This year's broadcast schedule was set up differently than those of previous years, since 2025 marked the start of NASCAR's new seven-year, $7.7 billion media rights deal with not only existing partners Fox and NBC but returning partner TNT Sports and newcomer Amazon Prime Video.
Fox's season-opening portion of the schedule dropped from 18 races (16 points races) to 14 (12) and NBC's dropped from 20 to 14. Previously, the majority of Fox's races had been on Fox, but this year, Fox Sports 1 aired nine of them, leaving Fox with only five.
Likewise, NBC's season-ending portion had been split up evenly between NBC and USA Network. But while USA Network stayed at 10 races, NBC plummeted to four, with just one prior to mid-October.
Amazon Prime Video's five-race portion of the schedule was placed immediately after Fox's, and TNT Sports followed suit with their five-race portion before NBC's.
Whether a race is shown live on NBC or USA Network, the broadcast booth trio consists of Leigh Diffey as the lead announcer alongside longtime analysts Jeff Burton and Steve Letarte.
NBC's live coverage of the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race is scheduled to begin at 3:00 p.m. ET this Sunday, November 2. If you have not already done so, start a free trial of FuboTV now and be sure to catch all of the action from Phoenix Raceway!