Larson said: “Denny was good there earlier this year. The 19 (Briscoe) has gotten way better as they’ve become comfortable with each other, so I’m sure he’ll be really strong. And he’s tough, he’s just a gamer, like he can figure out how to get to the front at any point.

“And William (Byron), with a performance like that tonight, he’s going to carry a lot of confidence.

“We have confidence in ourselves. I feel like we were decent there earlier this year and I think our short track package has gotten way better.

“I feel like at Gateway we were really strong, then at Loudon we were probably a little bit better than the Gibbs cars and maybe even my teammates for a lot of the race.

“I’m just glad we get an opportunity to go out there and race for a Championship.” 

Speaking on NBC about the race, Larson said: “Well, a couple times I just wanted to stay green. Then (Carson Hocevar) was in, like, every caution tonight. Restarts, I felt good about my car on restarts, but you never know how the aggression is going to pick up, and everybody’s give-a-shit factor goes out the window.

“We had good enough track position all day. We were kind of out of the mess, I guess. Yeah, that was good. My HendrickCars.com Chevy was fast. Our pit crew was on it all night. 

“What a performance by William. That’s awesome. I think when the 12 (Blaney) gained control of the race, it was going to be really hard for anybody to beat him. William did a great job on the restarts, just kept positioning himself. Was good enough to get by him on that long run. 

“I was surprised on the restart there, the two tires were as good as they were. So happy for him. Happy for our team. Happy for Hendrick Motorsports. This win is as good as it could have been for us, for us to score more points than Christopher, then have William or Chase win, too.

“Glad we can give Mr. H an opportunity next week. Hopefully one of us can win it. I’m proud of everybody at Hendrick Motorsports. I feel like we’ve been progressing so much throughout the Playoffs. To put two cars in the Championship 4 is awesome.”