Friday Faceoff: Which New Driver/Team Pairing Is the Most Intriguing?

Which new driver/team pairing is most intriguing?

Jake Altmayer: Ryan Preece and RFK Racing. Preece has shown flashes of brilliance over the course of his NASCAR Cup Series career, but he has yet to find victory lane and has never finished higher than 23rd in points. Meanwhile, RFK has been on the upswing over the past few seasons, with Chris Buescher scoring multiple wins and team co-owner Brad Keselowski finally snapping his long winless drought last year at Darlington Raceway. In addition, the RFK cars have shown great speed at short tracks as of late, which are where Preece has seemed to excel the most. So I wouldn’t be all that surprised to see him find victory lane at a track like Martinsville Speedway or Richmond Raceway in 2025. However, I’m still not sure how Preece’s season-long performance will compare to his two teammates or if he will have the speed and consistency necessary to point his way into the playoffs without a win.

James Krause: There’s a pair of drivers joining Front Row Motorsports: Noah Gragson and Zane Smith, who have an equal chance to falter or breakthrough and put the team at a new level. We saw Todd Gilliland have a great season last year, and Michael McDowell has proven that FRM has equipment capable of winning. With the team expanding to three cars, there’s a chance for the start of the season to be rough for all three drivers. If they can stay the course, however, Gragson and Smith have a chance to find themselves competing for top 10s regularly and elevate FRM to the level of being a top-tier team. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a pair of drivers who combine for two-and-a-half seasons of full-time Cup racing, though.

Landon Quesinberry: Riley Herbst and 23XI Racing. This pairing will be the most interesting to watch because the expectations of this pairing fall on a wide spectrum. I could see it hit the ground running and perform well all year, or it could have an up-and-down year due to Herbst’s growing pains as a rookie. Expect the pair to be in the playoff bubble conversation this year.

Josh Calloni: Chase Briscoe and Joe Gibbs Racing. Talent has never been a question for Briscoe, and he’s shown flashes of greatness in the Cup Series, most recently with his walkoff win at Darlington Raceway last fall. Now paired with one of the best teams in the garage area, the success started immediately, earning the Daytona 500 pole. Numerous wins in 2025 should be expected, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see the No. 19 come out over each of his teammates in the final standings at year’s end.

What are your expectations for Shane van Gisbergen?

Quesinberry: At least a playoff berth. He should be able to snag a win at one of the five road courses in the regular season. Shane van Gisbergen is the best road racer in Cup right now and on top of that is a quick study. He proved that last year in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. Van Gisbergen improved at every track over the course of the weekend and showed a lot of promise. Kansas Speedway was a good example of this, as van Gisbergen ran midpack most of the day but then found himself ripping the high line up to an eighth-place finish. Van Gisbergen will make the playoffs, and he could even make some noise and surprise people with a deep run.

Andrew Stoddard: Van Gisbergen is unquestionably one of the road course aces in NASCAR right now, and there are five such tracks on the 2025 regular-season slate. I anticipate him winning at least one of those races to make the playoffs and secure Cup Rookie of the Year honors over Herbst. Now, will van Gisbergen make a run in the playoffs? Probably not. The Round of 16 consists of three ovals in Darlington, World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway and Bristol Motor Speedway. Expect van Gisbergen to be one of four drivers making the earliest exit from the playoffs, but just being there would still be a good accomplishment as a rookie.

Calloni: The obvious answer is that van Gisbergen will win multiple road courses in 2025 and earn his way into the playoffs. However, he’ll hold his own on ovals as well. He had a few solid runs in the Xfinity Series last season on ovals, especially on drafting-style tracks. It’ll be hard to see him in victory lane on an oval, but he won’t be a pushover. Two wins and an 18th- to 21st-place finish in the regular-season standings seem not only realistic but something the Kiwi driver should strive for with his own goals.

Mike Neff: Van Gisbergen will be a contender for wins on road courses. He is continuing to learn the nuances of ovals and will probably have multiple top 10s by the time the season ends.

Who is most under pressure to perform in 2025?

Calloni: Preece. After a few years of average results in Stewart-Haas Racing equipment, Preece now finds himself on an up-and-coming RFK team, with new sponsorship backing and a freshly minted third chartered team surrounding him. He’s got a very good opportunity to win, and there is a lot of added pressure on his shoulders because of that heading into Daytona International Speedway to kick off the 2025 season. So far, so good as well, as he sat on the provisional pole for a lengthy amount of time during Daytona 500 qualifying and ended up third when the session was all said and done.

Altmayer: Daniel Suarez. While Suarez’s 2024 season may have seemed like a success to some, the reality is that he likely would have missed the playoffs for the second year in a row had it not been for his photo-finish victory at Atlanta Motor Speedway early in the season. In addition, he was also beaten by teammate Ross Chastain in nearly every statistical category last year (minus their final positions in points). With Trackhouse Racing expanding to three full-time cars in 2025, along with its recent announcement that young phenom Connor Zilisch will be making his Cup debut for the team at Circuit of the Americas, it puts additional pressure on Suarez to perform this season if he wants to keep his ride in 2026.

Krause: We saw at Darlington last year just how much the pressure to win weighs on drivers when Buescher shouted down Tyler Reddick after an on-track run-in. Buescher eventually got his winner’s sticker; it just came too late for him to make the playoffs after looking like a title contender the year prior. Buescher is one of many drivers who missed out on the playoffs despite great regular-season campaigns, but none had as many chances to find that playoff-clinching win as he did. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him pull out all the stops to get a win and turn his attention to bringing RFK a championship.

Neff: Denny Hamlin is a driver who is far closer to the end than the beginning of his career. He is still talented enough to win a title, but the opportunities are becoming very limited. If he doesn’t get it done in the next year or two, he probably never will.

Stoddard: Bubba Wallace needs to take another step forward this season. Wallace is currently in the midst of a 79-race winless streak, and he failed to make the playoffs in 2024 after making it on points in 2023. Furthermore, teammate Reddick won three races, earned the regular-season championship and made the Championship 4 using the same 23XI Toyota equipment. Wallace’s contract goes through at least 2026, so he is not racing for his job yet. However, there is no question that he is underperforming in his equipment, and that needs to change.

Who will win the Xfinity Rookie of the Year award?

Krause: Zilisch may mess around and win the series title, let alone Rookie of the Year. He’s great on road courses, but his oval accolades between the ARCA Menards Series and his few Xfinity starts show a ton of promise, not to mention a ride with JR Motorsports fresh off a title-winning season with Justin Allgaier. If there’s anyone who would give him a run for his money among the rookie class, it might be Christian Eckes at Kaulig Racing after his consistency and concrete dominance in the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series.

Altmayer: This is a pretty stacked rookie class of drivers, but I’ll go with Zilisch. Between the raw pace that Zilisch has shown virtually every time he’s gotten behind the wheel of a stock car and JRM coming off of a very successful year in which it won the championship with Allgaier (along with Zilisch winning in his series debut at Watkins Glen International), it’s very likely that Zilisch has a big year in 2025 as well and wins multiple races. I expect several of the other rookie contenders to give Zilisch some competition throughout the season (particularly teammate Carson Kvapil), but by the end of the year, Zilisch comes out on top.

Stoddard: This might be the most stacked rookie class in Xfinity history, but only one of them already has an NXS win on his resume. Zilisch dominated the field on his way to victory lane in his first career NXS start, announcing his arrival on the NASCAR stage. The 18-year-old brings the right combination of driver, car and team to the table to stand out from the rest of NXS rookies. Don’t be surprised if Zilisch wins multiple races and makes a run in the playoffs.

Neff: It is going to be a magnificent battle all season long, but Zilisch will be the winner. Eckes, Kvapil, William Sawalich and Zilisch will probably all win races, but Zilisch is going to rise above.

Quesinberry: Zilisch. He’s shown a ton of potential and is on arguably the best team in the Xfinity Series garage. That’s not to say that it won’t be close. Kvapil and Taylor Gray will give him a run for his money. Heck, the battle might come down to Phoenix Raceway with how stacked the rookie class is this year.