By David Morgan, Associate Editor
CONCORD, N.C. – Is there anything Connor Zilisch can’t do?
The JR Motorsports ace may be on his way to the NASCAR Cup Series next season, but the 19-year-old is certainly leaving his mark on the NASCAR Xfinity Series on his way there.
On Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Zilisch scored his 10th win of the season, continuing the hot streak the No. 88 team has been on since Memorial Day weekend, racking up win after win and not finishing worse than fifth place since missing a race at Texas Motor Speedway in early May.
Zilisch came into the day as the driver everyone expected to have to beat for the win and he lived up to his reputation, winning the pole and leading three times for 61 laps en route to the win, finishing 1.134 seconds ahead of Austin Green when the race was called early due to a caution on the final lap of overtime.
“It’s awesome to be able to do this at a home track and JR Motorsports had a really successful day, so cool to be a part of that and cool to finally get my first win here at Charlotte,” said Zilisch.
He added that no matter what happens from here on out, whether they win the championship or not, the 2025 campaign has been one for the record books for the No. 88 team.
“I’ve told my entire group, no matter what happens the next four races, it isn’t going to define our season,” said Zilisch. “Does that mean I’m not going to try to win the championship? No, it’s such a tough spot. There’s guys, I’m not even going to go down that road, but it’s just the way it is and you have to accept that and everybody’s got the same rules and everybody is in the same format.
“So regardless of how our season goes from here, I wouldn’t say that this season hasn’t been a success.”
Sammy Smith would come home in third-place to punch his ticket into the next round of the Playoffs, finishing one point ahead of Taylor Gray in the final points rundown for the final transfer spot.
Kaz Grala and Connor Mosack rounded out the top-five finishers, followed by Jeb Burton, William Sawalich, Justin Allgaier, Nick Sanchez, and Christian Eckes.
Joining Zilisch and Smith in the next round of the Playoffs will be Brandon Jones, who won last weekend at Kansas, along with defending Xfinity champion Allgaier, Sam Mayer, Jesse Love, Carson Kvapil, and Sheldon Creed.
The eight drivers in the penultimate round of the Playoffs include all four JRM drivers as they will look to make it a clean sweep of the Championship 4 and duke it out amongst themselves for the title.
“It’s tough to balance that, but I feel like all four of us have a good understanding and we all get along and we know when to be nice,” Zilisch said of the challenge of racing against teammates.
“And like today for instance, we were trying to help the 1 [Kvapil] and the 8 [Smith] do what they could to get in. There wasn’t much that I could really do to help them, but that was all of our goals coming in was to get the two of them through. So I’m glad that it worked out in that way.
“The 8 had a really good day. Sammy’s done a really good job growing as a road racer and Carson’s done a really good job as well this year. So yeah, it’s really cool and it’s hard.
“Dale tells us all the time when you have four fast cars and they’re at the front, there’s going to be times where things happen, but we try to do our best to manage it. I feel like if anything, I’ve been one of the culprits of a lot of bad things inside our building, so me, myself, I’ve tried to become a lot better at treating those guys the right way and I feel like I’ve gotten a little bit better at that.”
Saturday marked the end of the road for Taylor Gray, Nick Sanchez, Austin Hill, and Harrison Burton, all of whom were eliminated from the Playoffs.
Next up for the Xfinity Series will be a trip out west to Las Vegas Motor Speedway next Saturday to kick off the next round of the Playoffs, a three race stretch also including races at Talladega and Martinsville to determine who moves on to the season finale at Phoenix for the championship race.
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