The 8 NASCAR Drivers Most Likely To Win Their Way Into The 2025 Playoffs

With just five races remaining in the regular season portion of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series, 12 drivers have secured their place in the playoffs with a win. That means four drivers would currently advance to the playoffs on points.

However, a win by any driver other than the 12 who have already won would throw a wrench into that calculation. We’re counting down the eight drivers outside the top 12 who are most likely to win their way into the playoffs.

The 2025 playoffs for the NASCAR Cup Series are beginning to take shape. But as we saw last year when Harrison Burton came from nowhere to win his way into the postseason at Daytona, anything can happen.

In this slideshow, we’re counting down the eight drivers without a win this season who are most likely to lock themselves into the playoffs with a victory in the final five weeks of the regular season.

 

8) Brad Keselowski

Mathematically speaking, every other driver on this list has a realistic path to making the playoffs on points.

Not Keselowski. A brutal start to the season has him buried in 27th in the point standings and 140 points behind the cut line. But the former series champion has shown improved speed in recent months.

He has Cup Series victories at three of the five remaining tracks on the regular season schedule and is still one of the best restrictor plate racers in the series, making him a serious threat when they head to Daytona next month.

7) Bubba Wallace

Bubba Wallace is precariously positioned as the final driver to make the playoffs on points should we have no new winners in the next five weeks.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because Wallace was in the same position last season when Harrison Burton won at Daytona, leaving Wallace on the outside looking in.

This season, he’s shown a bit more consistency, and he heads to Indianapolis Motor Speedway this weekend, where he led 26 laps a year ago and won the second stage before finishing in fifth.

In fact, in four career starts on the IMS oval, Wallace has three top-10 finishes.

6) Michael McDowell

While McDowell might not seem like a favorite to win on any given week, especially given that Spire Motorsports is not one of the premier teams in the series, the schedule plays to his favor.

McDowell excels both on road courses and restrictor plate tracks, meaning upcoming trips to Watkins Glen and Daytona set up nicely for him to win his way into the playoffs.

McDowell has led laps in each of the last three visits to Watkins Glen, and each of the last five to Daytona. So while he’s not likely to factor in for the win at Iowa, Indy or Richmond, those two races make him a major threat to burst the playoff bubble.

5) Kyle Busch

Two-time series champion and future Hall of Famer Kyle Busch is nearing 70 races without a victory. But he’s a two-time champion for a reason, and if given capable equipment, Busch is certainly capable of handling the driving part.

Busch has 11 career victories at the five tracks left on the regular-season schedule, including six at Richmond alone. His Richard Childress Racing team also showed the most speed it had all season last year at Richmond.

By his standards, 2025 has been a massively disappointing year for Kyle Busch. But a win in the next five races could help change that narrative.

4) Alex Bowman

Bowman’s best chance at victory may well have come this past weekend at Dover, where he finished third and reeled off his fifth straight top-10 finish.

But don’t count him out at Iowa, where he finished eighth a year ago, or Watkins Glen, where he ran inside the top-10 during most of the race a year ago after qualifying fourth.

Ultimately, Bowman would be higher on this list if he’d shown he can more regularly close out races. But he’ll certainly have the equipment capable of competing for victories.

3) Chris Buescher

Buescher, like his teammate Keselowski, is coming up on a run of tracks that he traditionally finishes well at.

Last year, he held off Shane Van Gisbergen in an epic battle to win at Watkins Glen. The year before, he won the summer race at Daytona in thrilling fashion and dominated down the stretch at Richmond, leading 88 laps and claiming victory.

For most, the big surprise is that Buescher hasn’t won yet this season. But it wouldn’t shock anyone if he won not only one, but multiple races before the playoffs begin.

2) Ty Gibbs

When Ty Gibbs entered the NASCAR Cup Series in 2023, most predicted that he would have had multiple victories by now.

Gibbs is surprisingly still looking for his first win at the highest level of the sport. But he’s certainly coming close. Gibbs has finished in the top 10 each of the last three races and in four of the last seven.

He led laps at both Mexico City and Atlanta, and he looks far closer to teammates Chase Briscoe, Christopher Bell, and Denny Hamlin in recent weeks, each of whom has won this year.

Watkins Glen and Richmond are two tracks in particular where Gibbs has had success in the past.

1) Tyler Reddick

Unless we have five new winners in five weeks, or Reddick’s performance falls off a cliff, he’s going to qualify for the series playoffs on points.

Reddick currently sits fifth in the regular-season standings, but after winning multiple races in each of the last three seasons, he astonishingly has none in 2025.

But that could easily change soon. Reddick finished second at Indianapolis after leading 40 laps a year ago. He finished third at Richmond, and was the runner-up in this year’s Daytona 500.

At this point, it’s a bigger surprise with each week that passes that Reddick doesn’t have a win yet this season. It would be an absolute stunner if the breakthrough doesn’t come in the near future.