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HOMESTEAD, Fla. — Kyle Larson found his way into NASCAR’s headlines for a second consecutive week. This time for a much more pleasant reason.

Larson held off Ross Chastain to cap a dominant showing in the third-to-last race of the NASCAR season at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Sunday, leading 199 of the 267 laps over the 1½-mile course before taking the checkered flag.

It was Larson’s third win of the season and came a week after the reigning Cup Series champion, who was eliminated earlier in this year’s playoffs, was intentionally spun by Bubba Wallace in an act of retaliation at Las Vegas.

On Sunday, the suspended Wallace was watching. Larson, meanwhile, was winning.

“Definitely the best run we’ve had all year long,” Larson said.

AJ Allmendinger was third and Austin Dillon fourth as Chevrolets took the top four spots.

Even though Larson can’t win the title, his Hendrick Motorsports team still can and is very much in the mix for an owners championship.

“We’re still technically not out of it,” Larson said. “I can’t win the championship, but it means more to me to win it as a team. We’re going to go to Phoenix and try to get another championship.”

It wasn’t exactly close at the end; Larson beat Chastain to the line by 1.261 seconds. Chastain could have clinched a berth in the winner-take-all Phoenix race for the title if he had won at Homestead.

The four-car field for the title race will be decided next week in Martinsville, with seven drivers competing for the three remaining spots. Only Joey Logano, through his win at Las Vegas last week, has his berth clinched.

Expect chaos.

“Track position’s going to be so huge,” Denny Hamlin said. “You’re going to see aggressive driving.”

Hamlin is on the wrong side of the cut line going into Martinsville. Chastain is second, Chase Elliott is third, and Sunday’s pole sitter, William Byron, is fourth.

“It took a good part of the race to get up there and get the car turning,” Chastain said. “Incredible day on pit road by the boys.”

There will be a race within the race next week. Chastain doesn’t need to win to clinch a berth in the field for the title race, but he didn’t seem too interested in all the mathematical permutations after getting out of his car in Homestead.

“We’re just going to go race,” Chastain said. “That’s all I know how to do.”

Hamlin is five points back of Byron, followed by Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell and Chase Briscoe in eighth.

Among the playoff drivers, after runner-up Chastain, Hamlin was seventh, Bell 11th, Byron 12th, Elliott 14th, Blaney 17th, Logano 18th and Briscoe 36th in the 36-car field.

Martin Truex Jr., who led 28 laps, was headed to the pits late in the race when a caution flag came out and found trouble as he got there. Larson tapped the back of Truex’s car, and Truex wound up spinning 180 degrees, ending up in his stall but with the front of his car facing in the wrong direction. It also seemed possible, given where Truex was, that he might have missed his stall entirely as the setting sun started casting serious shadows over much of Homestead.

“My team said he was late turning into his stall,” Larson said. “I don’t know. If it was my fault, I’m sorry. I don’t think it was. It’s hard to see on this pit road.”

For as bad as that moment was for Truex, it could have been much worse. His skidding car sent members of his pit crew scurrying for safety, some getting over the wall with just a split second to spare.

“It was really hard to see,” Truex said. “… I did see my box late, for sure.”

Truex came back to finish sixth and raced teammate Hamlin hard for late position, costing Hamlin valuable playoff points.

Briscoe — a past winner at Homestead in the Truck and Xfinity series — came into Sunday looking for a big showing that would help his playoff hopes. He didn’t make it out of stage 2. Briscoe completed only 160 laps, going into the wall and damaging his car beyond repair.

“It’s broke bad,” Briscoe said into his radio as white smoke billowed from the back of his Ford.

Briscoe’s title chances are badly damaged now as well, and his only path toward making the finale in Phoenix is to win next week at Martinsville.

He blamed himself. Driver’s mistake, he said.

“It’s like I hit ice,” Briscoe said. “Frustrating. I think that’s the first time I ever just crashed by myself. Embarrassing on that side. Of all the times for it to happen, that’s not when we needed it to happen. We know what we need to do next week now.”

NO SMOKE

NASCAR Hall of Famer Tony Stewart had been slated to serve as grand marshal for the race. Plans changed, and country singer Kip Moore, who performed a prerace concert, wound up giving the “Drivers, start your engines” command.

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Sale, Crochet named comeback players of year

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Sale, Crochet named comeback players of year

LAS VEGAS — Left-handers Chris Sale of the Atlanta Braves and Garrett Crochet of the Chicago White Sox won Major League Baseball’s Comeback Player of the Year awards on Thursday.

Cleveland right-hander Emmanuel Clase won his second AL Reliever of the Year award and St. Louis righty Ryan Helsley won the NL honor.

Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani joined David Ortiz as the only players to win four straight Outstanding Designated Hitter awards. Ohtani and the New York YankeesAaron Judge won Hank Aaron Awards as the outstanding offensive performers in their leagues.

Major League Baseball made the announcements at its All-MLB Awards Show.

Sale, 35, was 18-3 with a 2.38 ERA and 225 strikeouts in 177⅔ innings for the NL’s first pitching triple crown since the Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw in 2011. He earned his eighth All-Star selection and first since 2018.

Sale helped Boston to the 2018 World Series title but made just 56 starts from 2020-23, going 17-18 with a 4.86 ERA, 400 strikeouts and 79 walks over 298⅓ innings. He was acquired by Boston from the White Sox in December 2016 and made nine trips to the injured list with the Red Sox, mostly with shoulder and elbow ailments. He had Tommy John surgery on March 30, 2020, and returned to a big league mound on Aug. 14, 2021.

Sale fractured a rib while pitching in batting practice in February 2022 during the management lockout. On July 17, in his second start back, he broke his left pinkie finger when he was hit by a line drive off the bat of the Yankees’ Aaron Hicks. Sale broke his right wrist while riding a bicycle en route to lunch on Aug. 6, ending his season.

Crochet, 25, was 6-12 with a 3.58 ERA over 32 starts for a White Sox team that set a post-1900 record of 121 losses, becoming a first-time All-Star. He struck out 209 and walked 33 in 146 innings.

He had Tommy John surgery on April 5, 2022, and returned to the major leagues on May 18, 2023. Crochet had a 3.55 ERA in 13 relief appearances in 2023, and then joined the rotation this year.

Sale and Crochet were chosen in voting by MLB.com beat writers.

Clase and Helsley were unanimous picks by a panel that included Hall of Famers Trevor Hoffman, Mariano Rivera, Dennis Eckersley and Rollie Fingers, along with John Franco and Billy Wagner. The AL award is named after Rivera and the NL honor after Hoffman.

A three-time All-Star, Clase was 4-2 with a 0.61 ERA, 66 strikeouts and 10 walks in 74⅓ innings, holding batters to a .154 average. The 26-year-old converted 47 of 50 save chances, including his last 47.

Voting was based on the regular season. Clase was 0-2 with a 9.00 ERA in the playoffs, allowing three home runs, one more than his regular-season total.

Helsley, a two-time All-Star, was 7-4 with a 2.04 ERA and 49 saves in 53 chances. He struck out 79 and walked 23 in 66⅓ innings.

Ohtani became the first player with 50 or more homers and 50 or more stolen bases in a season. A two-way star limited to hitting following elbow surgery, Ohtani batted .310 and led the NL with 54 homers and 130 RBIs while stealing 59 bases.

Ortiz won the DH award five years in a row from 2003-07.

The DH award, named after Edgar Martinez, is picked in voting by team beat writers, broadcasters and public relations departments. MLB.com writers determined the finalists for the Aaron awards, and a fan vote was combined with picks from a panel of Hall of Famers and former winners to determine the selections.

Judge led the major leagues with 58 homers and 144 RBIs while hitting .322.

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Georgia leading rusher Etienne ruled out vs. Vols

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Georgia leading rusher Etienne ruled out vs. Vols

No. 12 Georgia will be without leading rusher Trevor Etienne for Saturday’s showdown against No. 7 Tennessee.

Etienne was downgraded from questionable to out on Thursday night’s SEC availability report.

Etienne left Georgia’s win over Florida with an upper-body injury on Nov. 2 and did not return. He played limited snaps in last week’s 28-10 loss at Ole Miss, carrying the ball six times for 24 yards.

Etienne leads the Bulldogs with 477 rushing yards and seven touchdowns this season.

The loss is another blow to Georgia’s banged-up backfield. Cash Jones is also listed as questionable while Branson Robinson remains out after missing the past three games with a knee injury.

That leaves true freshman Nate Frazier as the only healthy Bulldogs running back who has played meaningful snaps this year. Frazier is second on the team with 333 rushing yards and three touchdowns.

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QB Castellanos exits after losing BC starting job

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QB Castellanos exits after losing BC starting job

Boston College quarterback Thomas Castellanos, who lost his starting job earlier this week, will not be returning to the team, he announced Thursday night.

Castellanos, who started 12 games last season and retained the top job under new coach Bill O’Brien, wrote on X that “unfortunately, all good things come to an end, even though it’s sooner than I would like.” He did not mention the transfer portal in his departing message and has not officially entered it. The junior from Waycross, Georgia, started his career at UCF and appeared in five games in 2022.

O’Brien said Tuesday that Grayson James, who replaced Castellanos in last week’s win against Syracuse, will start Saturday when Boston College visits No. 14 SMU. Castellanos “wasn’t real thrilled” with the decision, O’Brien said, adding that the quarterback decided to step away from the team for several days.

Castellanos had 2,248 passing yards and 1,113 rushing yards last season under coach Jeff Hafley, passing for 15 touchdowns and adding 13 on the ground. He had 18 touchdown passes and only five interceptions this season, but his accuracy dipped in recent weeks, and he completed only 2 of 7 passes against Syracuse before being replaced.

In his statement, Castellanos thanked both coaching staffs he played for at Boston College and wrote that he had “some of the best experiences of my life in the Eagles Nest and I will truly cherish these memories forever.”

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