Tony Stewart’s protégé has clenched his teeth. After a rollercoaster ride of jolting emotions throughout the season, Chase Briscoe is not letting go easily. Determined to deliver a final act of glory to Stewart’s disintegrating Stewart-Haas Racing team, Briscoe excelled at Bristol. Although he had to fend off a hard-charging Ty Gibbs, he was able to secure his playoff spot for the next round.

But the Round of 12 holds some tricky tracks for the No. 14 Ford team. Yet Briscoe believes that if he shines in the face of adversity a couple more times, the following round will be easier. More importantly, Briscoe is beaming with confidence about this prospect.

Chase Briscoe is ready to deliver

When Tony Stewart first opened SHR in 2008, the race team hosted legends. From winning two championships to 70 Cup Series victories, the team has probably achieved everything. But the news of its closure came crashing down this May to its slew of employees—most of whom will be out of a job next year. So as a final salute to SHR’s legacy and its scores of hardworking employees, Chase Briscoe is putting up stellar runs. Although Atlanta severely damaged his playoff hopes, he pieced them back together at Watkins Glen and Bristol.

On Saturday night, he entered the Bass Pro Shops Night Race with 6 points above the cutline. And he executed what he was required to do – prevail above the cutline by all means. However, Briscoe is wary of the upcoming tracks: “It’s not gonna be an easy path – with the points that we have started the round off with every time. But you know, this round has 12 on stage, probably the one that clears me most out of all the rounds. You know, the racetracks…for us, the kind of tracks like Kansas for example, the track where we haven’t done super super good at. Then Talladega for example, anything can happen but the roadblocks will get them out.”

Yet, as Chase Briscoe has declared earlier, he performs well under duress. So simply entering the Round of 12 as a championship contender makes him a solid threat to rivals. Briscoe exuded prime confidence in his ability: “I think that we can honestly get to the final four, I see a really good path.” The good path begins after the round of 12 is done and dusted. “If we can get to the round of 8, I feel like those are honestly really our best racetracks. So yeah, we gotta get to this round, and if we can do that, we can make a good run out of it.”

This is the type of grit and determination Tony Stewart’s fold has experienced lately. The shadow of their insecure future hangs fiercely over them, yet Chase Briscoe and his team are willing to go all out to show what they are made of.

Stewart’s team defines resilience

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Needing to claw out of the playoff-opening mess was not what SHR’s No. 14 team expected. Chase Briscoe finished 38th at Atlanta after a crash with Kyle Larson and found himself 21 points down. Yet they persevered—while everybody else went bonkers at Watkins Glen, Briscoe delivered a stellar 6th-place finish. Then at Bristol, he weathered some challenges—Briscoe’s digital rearview mirror faltered, smoke filled his cockpit, and a slow pit stop stuttered his progress. And yet the team prevailed above the cutline and carved its way into the next round.

Chase Briscoe summed up his team’s tenacity recently. “I think our backs are up against the wall. No other team in this sport can relate to what we’re going through and just how hungry we all are, so I think we all want to go out as winners and we just know that we’re capable of doing it when we put it together,” Briscoe said. “I think, for us, when we finally did win at Darlington we kind of proved that to ourselves and just the confidence that has come with that over the last three weeks has been a lot, so looking forward to the next however many races we’ve got left.”

So Tony Stewart is in for a bumpy ride as the No. 14 team is not going to give up soon. We wish Chase Briscoe and his team all the very best for the upcoming races.