Are Kyle Larson, Cliff Daniels the new Jimmie Johnson and Chad Knaus?

For years — five in a row and seven times in 11 years, to be exact — NASCAR fans watched Jimmie Johnson, crew chief Chad Knaus and the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports team have a good, sometimes even great regular season before they turned on the afterburners in the postseason. 

Make no mistake about it: Johnson was always good in the regular season. But in the Chase, he and Knaus always turned up the speed and execution dials all the way. 

That led the No. 48 team to five consecutive NASCAR Cup Series championships from 2006-10 and two more in 2013 and 2016, the last of which tied Johnson with Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the most titles in NASCAR history at seven. 

Kyle Larson and crew chief Cliff Daniels could be the new Jimmie Johnson and Chad Knaus

Now, Kyle Larson and crew chief Cliff Daniels look to be the new version of Johnson and Knaus. 

The duo behind the venerated Hendrick Motorsports No. 5 team over the last six years have plenty of work to do if they are to catch up to Johnson and Knaus. But Larson, 34, already has two titles to his name and is in line for a third. He leads Denny Hamlin by 40 points with five races left in 2026. 

While he's only won one race (Gateway) in the Chase so far, Larson hasn't finished worse than fifth through the first five races of the postseason. His average finish in those five races? A video game-esque 2.2. 

Johnson's best average finish during one of his championship runs was an even 5.0. Larson didn't have an average finish better than seventh in either of his two prior title runs. 

Part of the reason why Larson was off for much of the regular season was the fact that both Hendrick and Chevrolet were adjusting to the new Camaro body for 2026. As Toyota pulled ahead, especially at the intermediate tracks Larson tends to dominate at, fans became worried. 

Larson had already gone winless over the final 24 races of 2025. While he won a second championship, he did so thanks to his consistency and a well-timed yellow in the championship race at Phoenix. 

This year, with a new points format based more on consistency, Larson was once again consistent, but without winning speed. He didn't break what turned into a 51-race drought until Gateway on Sept. 13. 

But the speed that once was under the hood for Larson every week has returned this postseason, beginning at Darlington, where he finished fifth. He snuck through late-race chaos at Bristol to finish second, beat Chase Briscoe in a hard-fought battle to win at Kansas and came up just shy of beating Briscoe for the win again on Sunday at Las Vegas. 

Larson is the only repeat winner of the Chase so far, and despite starting as the No. 7 seed, 55 points back of Hamlin. 

Through five races, Larson has turned iffy title hopes into a 95-point swing and is now the favorite as he and Daniels look for a third championship. 

Calling them the next Johnson and Knaus may be premature, but it's not the most outrageous diagnosis by any stretch.