For most of this season, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. has been doing something remarkable: keeping his nose clean. In a field full of multimillion-dollar operations, the single-car JTG Daugherty No. 47 team has been punching above its weight like a welterweight in a heavyweight bar fight. Not particularly fast, no, but stubborn. Relentlessly stubborn. Heading into Nashville, Stenhouse was 13th in the standings and 10 points to the good in the playoff grid. Not flashy, but effective—like a rented Corolla that just won’t die.
Then came Carson Hocevar.
Yes, that Hocevar. The same young driver who’s been collecting run-ins the way some people collect vintage guitars—loud, expensive, and often not in tune. And on Sunday, he struck again.
Midway through Stage 2, with Stenhouse running 17th and playing the long game, Hocevar decided that braking was optional and patience was for someone else. He sent it—hard—into the corner and straight into the back bumper of the No. 47 Chevrolet, punting Stenhouse into the outside wall like yesterday’s garbage. Race over. 39th place. One measly point. And a very, very unhappy driver climbing out of the wreck.
“A lap or two before, he tried to dive in there from about ten car lengths back,” Stenhouse said, managing to stay just on the polite side of “furious.” “That time, I just opened my entry a little bit and he over-charged the corner and drilled us in the rear bumper.”
Which, if you’ve followed Hocevar’s antics, is becoming something of a signature move. He’s less of a dive-bomber and more of a torpedo, launched without warning and guided mostly by ambition.
Stenhouse, who hadn’t failed to finish a race since Watkins Glen last September, was understandably miffed. He stopped short of a full declaration of war, but left little doubt there’s now a score to settle. “Bummed our day ended like that,” he said, “definitely will have something to do about it at one point.”
Translation: You just made the list, kid.
This is a painful setback for Stenhouse, who was on track for his best average finish since 2019—an unspectacular-but-solid 16.8, second-best in the field for laps completed.
Now? He’s got a wrecked car, a headache, and a Carson Hocevar-shaped target in his crosshairs.
For Hocevar, it’s just another entry in a growing file marked “Incidents.” For Stenhouse, it could be the moment his playoff hopes started to unravel.
Either way, Hocevar might want to check his mirrors a little more often in the coming weeks.
Especially if the guy behind him is from Olive Branch, Mississippi.
Hocevar would go on to finish second, tying his career best with Atlanta earlier in the season. He did his best to fend off the wolves at the door when the race was over.
“I haven’t seen the replay,” he said. “I mean, I’ve seen a bunch of people just kind of do that same sort of move and get shipped, and I think he was the only one to wreck or for me to wreck him, or maybe there was one more. But I feel like that was just a common move with how big of a run I had. But I didn’t see it.
“I’m sure he’ll want to talk about it. I’ll talk about it. We’ll look at the replay. But I have no idea until I see it.”
Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.