NASCAR.com’s Pat DeCola ranks the top 20 Cup Series drivers competing for the 2026 championship after Ryan Blaney’s win at Phoenix Raceway — his second in a row at the 1-mile desert oval — and before Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube at Las Vegas Motor Speedway (4 p.m. ET, FS1, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Wood Brothers Racing driver Josh Berry enters as the defending winner.
RELATED: Las Vegas weekend schedule | Full 2026 Cup Series schedule
Analysis: An “ordinary” eighth-place run for Reddick feels like a quiet week, which is a pretty absurd statement, but there’s nowhere to go but down when you get accustomed to winning every week. He mentioned on pit road after the race how focused his No. 45 team is on points and with top 10s in half of his 12 Vegas starts, he should cash in for some more this weekend.
Analysis: Not that we needed one, but Phoenix was a reminder that Blaney remains one of the sport’s best closers, passers, grinders, rebounders, you name it, especially when a race has a way of throwing an extra heap of chaos at him, which it, for whatever reason, often seems to. This upcoming weekend feels like the spot it finally all clicks together for him at Vegas, where he shockingly has yet to win, and Reddick’s early standings strangle could wind up loosening in shorter order than we thought, unfurled meticulously by Mr. Mustachio.
Analysis: Larson didn’t leave Phoenix with another trophy, but he did leave it looking like the same weekly threat he’s been whenever this series unloads on a non-drafting track. Vegas, of course, is one of his playgrounds: three wins, nine top fives, 14 top 10s and a staggering 819 laps led in 19 Cup starts there, plus wins in two of the last five races. After jumping five spots in the standings at Phoenix, he could do it again on Sunday.
Analysis: Hamlin’s year still feels a little quieter than it should, but Phoenix at least looked like the beginning of a stabilizing ramp-up rather than treading water out of the gate. Vegas is one of the places where that can turn into something bigger for him, given Hamlin’s two wins there and 15 top 10s in 28 starts. He can continue to build, but this could also be a conversion week, and that could go a long way for a team still likely ruminating in the back of their minds about what could’ve been just a handful of months ago.
Analysis: Wallace has now made enough noise early in the year that this is not some feel-good blip — there’s little reason to view him as anything other than a title contender at the moment. He sits third in points through four races, and, like Phoenix, Vegas offers a chance to prove himself after he’s amassed just two top 10s there in 16 career starts for a 22.6 average finish. And no reason to think he won’t clear that bar right now.
Analysis: Elliott’s Phoenix finish is the sort of result that can make a week look worse than it really was, running second at one point but getting derailed in a pileup not of his doing that eventually saddled him with a P23. But points are points. Vegas is not one of his absolute signature venues, but he’s found the front of the field enough there that he doesn’t feel quite “due,” but he does feel close.
Analysis: Byron still hasn’t fully erupted in 2026 the way we’ve grown accustomed to seeing him do early in seasons, but that could all be about to change this weekend. The spring 2023 Vegas race winner owns eight top 10s, four top fives and 337 laps led in 16 Cup starts there, and this feels like a weekend where he and Hendrick Motorsports as a whole could establish some 2026 dominance.
Analysis: There’s no denying Bell was the driver to beat on Sunday – and unfortunately for him, he was – but it was still an extremely encouraging sign for the No. 20 team and a clear signal to the field that more days like that are ahead, perhaps as soon as Sunday. Though he’s yet to win at Vegas, he’s certainly capable of doing so and finished inside the top five in each of the past three fall races there.
Analysis: Logano is not exactly leaving Phoenix with momentum in the traditional sense, but the speed – he and Blaney were arguably the only cars capable of matching Bell – matters more than the finish at this stage. Vegas history makes that even easier to move past the desert disappointment with four wins in Nevada already on his resume and a fifth a strong possibility on Sunday.
Analysis: If SVG can keep turning in runs like Phoenix and maximizing his days on road courses and superspeedways, we’re looking at what appears to be at minimum a Chase contender with a ceiling that will only continue to elevate. And now we get to see if he’s actually progressed from a year ago, because his first three Vegas starts have been quite rough, with a 32.0 average finish and a pair of crashes.
Analysis: Briscoe’s season remains one of the trickier reads in the field because we know the highs are coming, but boy, have these lows been costly. Las Vegas doesn’t offer the most respite as results have been mixed for him in Cup, but his broader resume matters to a degree, too, and he’s a two-time O’Reilly Auto Parts Series winner there.
Analysis: Buescher didn’t light the race on fire, but he did put together a composed 14th-place run with Stage 2 points, continuing to remain in the conversation throughout races, but yet to fully land a defining finish in 2026 so far. Ford did win the Vegas race last year, but this probably won’t be the weekend it all materializes for him with just two top 10s across 18 starts there.
Analysis: Chastain’s weekly ceiling remains high, but Phoenix was just a messy race, and he’s now – with the caveat that we’re only four races in – on pace for his worst average finish in a full-time Cup season since 2019. Vegas gives him a decent place to steady things, though, with six top 10s, five top fives and 167 laps led in 15 Cup starts there.
Analysis: McDowell and Spire continue to build themselves into weekly players, and it’s fair to say we’ve essentially arrived at that point. The defending Vegas pole winner just needs to maintain this steady level of returns to make The Chase, and though he’s never finished in the top 10 at Vegas over a whopping 24 starts, would you be surprised if he still found a way to maximize his day and walk away with a decent points haul?
Analysis: Gibbs is driving with plenty of motivation, and he nearly got the better of the best at Phoenix to score his first career Cup win on Sunday, settling for a strong fourth. It still feels very much like a matter of “when,” not “if,” and the former O’Reilly Series winner at Vegas could back it up this week and quiet a lot of chatter by getting the job done in Sin City and positioning himself as a legitimate Chase contender.
Analysis: The Cook Out Clash winner had a nice recovery at Phoenix after an in-race spin, but it went a bit under the radar, where Preece still finished outside the top 10. Vegas is not a historical comfort zone for him, with one top five, two top 10s and a 21.4 average finish in 12 starts, so this week is more about sustaining the baseline than expecting fireworks.
Analysis: A steadily progressive day at Phoenix from the back was a respectable race for Keselowski, who did what he needed to do, knowing a win was a long shot, with a potential victory spot around the corner. The 2012 champ’s Vegas resume features three wins, nine top fives, 14 top 10s, 361 laps led and if RFK brings enough speed, he’s one of the easier sleepers to spot this week.
Analysis: Phoenix was a bit of a mess for Allmendinger, who had a hand in the big multicar crash with Joey Logano before recovering slightly to finish 19th. Vegas, meanwhile, has historically been pretty ordinary for him at the Cup level – 15 starts, three top 10s, no top fives and a 19.7 average finish – though he does own O’Reilly wins there, including one as recently as 2024.
Analysis: Suárez’s final result was ugly, but it was not empty, as he scored stage points and looked like a contender all weekend before getting caught in the Turn 1 pileup and finishing 30th. Suárez now gets a track where his Cup history is better than people might assume – in 17 Vegas starts, he has four top 10s, two top fives and 168 laps led. If Spire has real speed again, this is a credible rebound week rather than a hopeful one.
Analysis: Hocevar is still in the phase where the speed flashes are outrunning the weekly polish, as he clearly had the pace to contend as late as Stage 2 but couldn’t navigate the final stage chaos and wound up 20th. He still needs a fair degree of refinement at Vegas as well, with an average finish of 27.2 and both finishes last year being 30th or worse, but we know the ceiling is still very high for Hocevar.