WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 11, 2017 SPORTS3C
Carl Edwards, you iconoclast.
You extremely interesting, in-
tensely private man. You appar-
ently are ready to add another
element to the saga that was your
laureled and on-the-cusp-of-
great NASCAR career.
And you apparently are ready
to do that by ending your NAS-
CAR career — at least for now.
Joe Gibbs Racing isn’t com-
menting but has called two news
conferences for Wednesday, per-
fect for a retirement announce-
ment and promotion of in-house
product and Xfinity Series cham-
pion Daniel Suarez to the No. 19
Toyota that Edwards used to fin-
ish fourth in the final Cup series
standings in 2016.
On the face of it, this is truly
stunning.
A37-year-old former substi-
tute teacher who passed out busi-
ness cards in garages before
signing with then-power Roush
Fe nway R a c i n g i n 2 0 0 3, E d wa r d s
has 28 wins in 445 starts over 13
seasons at NASCAR’s top level.
He was second in points in- And he lost the 2011 cham-
pionship despite finishing second
in the season finale at Home-
stead-Miami Speedway because
Tony Stewart won the race to
claim his third and final title.
He was one of four drivers eli-
gible to finally win that elusive
crown in November but was in-
volved in a late incident blocking
Joey Logano that wrecked away
his chances. In a moment and in a
Chase for the Sprint Cup format
that has engendered and at times
celebrated the release of rage, Ed-
wards was the model of decorum,
accepting responsibility to the
point of flabbergasting his peers.
If Edwards was contemplating
retirement before that moment,
then the moment is all the more
incredible. Or he’s all the more
ready for what’s next. His last
chance at a Cup championship
was gone. He didn’t seem to be
taking farewell looks at the place
before he strode off into his next
chapter.
Maybe he returns as a televi-
sion analyst. Jeff Gordon made a
successful transition after retir-
ing following the 2015 season.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. was good at it
in a spot role last season. And
full-time Cup driver Kevin Har-
vick will expand his booth time
this season during Xfinity Series
races. If so, the image of Edwards
retrenching to the seclusion of
the Missouri farm to mind the
corn and safeguard the privacy of
his family will be somewhat de-
romanticized. Exiting a job with
NASCAR’s most successful team
the last two years, at the peak of
his talents, remains highly unusu-
al in a sport in which drivers, like
boxers, often linger a bit long,
seeking the fairy-tale finish.
Edwards has seemed pained to
venture too far into private de-
tails in the past, to extend himself
too far for risk of damage —
whether lobbying for competitive
changes or some other issue. But
it will certainly be interesting to
hear his reasoning this time.PETER CASEY, USA TODAY SPORTS
In 13 Cup seasons, Carl Edwards was in the top five in points six times. He was fourth in 2016.
Edwards was never one
to do things by the book
Brant James
[email protected]
USA TODAY Sports
FOLLOW REPORTER
BRANT JAMES
@brantjames for breaking motor
sports news and analysis.After getting his first career
Xfinity Series win and ulti-
mately the series title in 2016,
it seemed as though Daniel
Suarez was a year or two from
making it to NASCAR’s top
level.
But Carl Edwards’ shocking
and sudden retirement creat-
ed a void in Joe Gibbs Racing ’s
No. 19 car — and that will be
filled by Suarez, a person with
direct knowledge of the situa-
tion told USA TODAY Sports
on Tuesday. The person was
not authorized to speak pub-
licly.
So NASCAR’s greatest hope
for diversity at its top level of
racing suddenly has arrived,
and Suarez will be the first
Mexican-born driver to com-
pete full time in the Monster
Energy NASCAR Cup Series.
He’ll have a great chance for
success, considering he has acoveted spot at JGR and will
be driving a car capable of
winning races.
Is he ready for the big
leagues? That’s debatable, giv-
en his relative lack of experi-
ence.
Suarez, 25, excelled in NAS-
CAR’s Mexico Series but didn’t
start driving regularly in the
U.S. national series (Cup, Xfin-
ity and Camping World Truck)
until 2015. He has never made
a start in the Cup series, nor
were there any announced
plans to do so this year.
But the thought was JGR
was grooming him to get there
eventually, especially with
sponsor Arris — which he
shared with Edwards — be-
hind him. Another year focus-
ing solely on Xfinity would
have served him well, but cir-
cumstances didn’t work out
that way.
With JGR farming out its
other top prospect, Erik Jones,
to affiliate Furniture Row Rac-
ing for at least the 2017 sea-
son, the time became now for
Suarez to make the Cup jump.
Now Jones and Suarez will
compete against each other for
rookie of the year honors, an-
other sign NASCAR’s next
generation is arriving faster
than expected.JASEN VINLOVE, USA TODAY SPORTS
Daniel Suarez, enjoying his Xfinity Series championship
in November, has shown talent but is short on experience.Suarez gets call
to fill JGR seat
Edwards’ move
means early leap
for Xfinity champ
Jeff Gluck
@jeff_gluck
USA TODAY SportsShe sat to my right as I spoke
to the team, one of a dozen faces
looking at me as I looked back at
them in the visiting locker room
at the University of Maryland on
Saturday afternoon.
I didn’t know her. We had met
briefly a year earlier, just a hand-
shake, nothing more. Nonethe-
less, 19-year-old sophomore
guard Jordan Hankins, sitting in
a chair in her purple uniform just
minutes after a tough loss to the
Terrapins, was someone I had
come to talk to, and to thank.
In addition to being a colum-
nist and commentator, I’m on the
board of trustees at my alma ma-
ter, Northwestern University.
One of my great joys is to be a
part of the lives of as many NU
students as possible, including
our women’s sports teams.
So, when the basketball team
was coming to play in the Wash-
ington, D.C., suburbs near my
home, it was only natural that I’d
pay a visit to the locker room af-
ter the game.
Coach Joe McKeown asked me
to say a few words. It had been a
difficult game, a 96-65 loss to
third-ranked Maryland, but I
didn’t want to focus on that. I
wanted to focus on the players.
They are amazing students. They
are terrific athletes. And they will
be great leaders in our country
for the next 50 years.I said all of that. I also made
sure to thank them for the won-
derful way they represent the
university. It was just a few min-
utes, but I hoped they felt a little
better when I was done. The
game was important, yes, but
there was so much more aheadfor each of them.
As the players got up, I said
hello to a few of them. I didn’t
speak to Jordan, but my sister
did. She had come to the game
with me and snapped a few pho-
tos. In that cramped space as we
were about to leave, she hap-pened to find herself next to Jor-
dan for a moment.
“Good game,” she said. Jordan
thanked her.
And that was that — until
Monday night, when the news
broke that Jordan had died in her
dorm room on campus in Evans-
ton, Ill., the same dorm I lived in
my freshman and sophomore
years.
My sister had texted me the
photos she took, so I started look-
ing through them, and sure
enough, there was Jordan. She
was partially obscured by a team-
mate, but I could see that she was
listening intently.
The photo was heartbreaking.
In a room full of young women
with their whole lives ahead of
them, one would be gone in less
than 48 hours.
On Tuesday, the Cook County
(Ill.) Medical Examiner’s report
on Jordan was released. Her
death was ruled a suicide. She
hanged herself.
It’s hard to take my eyes off the
photo from the locker room.
There are Jordan and her team-
mates, looking serious, even
glum, because they had just lost
an important Big Ten basketball
game. These are competitive,
strong, bright women. It was un-
derstandable, of course, that they
would feel that way.
They, and all of us around
them, had no idea what was to
come.TRAGEDY AT NORTHWESTERN HITS HOME
Player’s suicide
at alma mater
heartbreaking
Christine Brennan
[email protected]
USA TODAY Sports
Northwestern guard Jordan Hankins (5), shown in a game last March, was found dead in her
dorm room Monday in Evanston, Ill. Tuesday, the sophomore’s death was ruled a suicide.FOLLOW COLUMNIST
CHRISTINE BRENNAN
@cbrennansports to keep up with
the latest sports issues.