Ben Rhodes must take care of business in Truck Series regular-season finale

Ben Rhodes hasn't quite had the 2024 season that he envisioned, but he should have a simple task on his mind in Saturday's NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series regular-season finale: Take care of business. 

The defending Truck Series champion enters Saturday's short track showdown at Richmond ninth on the playoff grid, 22 points above the cut line. While he's more than two full stages to the good on points, one slip-up could cause the two-time champion to miss out on the postseason entirely, an almost unthinkable fate for Rhodes and his venerable No. 99 team at the start of the season. 

A four-race skid to start the year was worrying, but a solid seventh-place finish at COTA seemed to right the ship. After that top-10 finish in Austin, three more finishes of 14th or worse plagued the No. 99 team as the series rolled into Darlington on May 10. 

A crew chief change before Darlington seemed to flip a switch for Rhodes and his struggling team, as a season-best third-place finish at the Lady In Black was the precursor to a five-race stretch in which Rhodes finished seventh or better four times. Rhodes went from as low as 12th in the standings all the way up to eighth, even with finishes of 18th at Pocono and 21st at IRP dragging him down. 

At 27 years old, Rhodes is a Truck Series veteran. He knows when to push his truck, when to hold back and when to put all the chips on the table. If he thinks he can contend for the win in Saturday's race, he'll do so, but the one mantra that the No. 99 team should repeat throughout the weekend is to simply take care of business. If Rhodes can at least finish inside the top 15, he'll be a part of the 2024 postseason field.