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AVONDALE, Ariz. - Kevin Harvick finally has a shot to win his first Sprint Cup championship, while Jeff Gordon was once again denied in his drive for No. 5.Harvick routed the field Sunday at Phoenix International Raceway, where he had to win to move into NASCARs championship finale. Hell go with Stewart-Haas Racing, the team he joined this season in his quest to win a title after 13 years of futility at Richard Childress Racing.Coming over here and racing this year has given me new life, Harvick said. Its like a dream. You lay it all out on paper and you say, This is what we want to do and we want to race for wins and championships, and all of a sudden youre a week away from everything that you talk about and dream about.Hell race Denny Hamlin, Joey Logano and Ryan Newman next Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway for the championship. The title will be decided by finishing order, and all four will be vying for their first championship.The championship field does not include Gordon or Brad Keselowski, who along with Harvick were the most dominant drivers all season. Keselowski has won a series-best six races, Gordon has won four times and led the points most of the season, and both showed the intensity of this new elimination-style Chase for the Sprint Cup championship with a pit road brawl last week that left both former champions bloodied.A disappointed Gordon said the on-track aggression and off-track intensity at Homestead will make Texas and the last month of racing look tame.If it was that ugly the past few weeks, its going to be real ugly next week, Gordon said.There were no fights following this race, but it was still intense as the championship field flipped and flopped with every lap. The most shocking change came after Gordon had crossed the finish line in second behind Harvick and thought he was in. Instead, Ryan Newman, needed one more position to bump Gordon out of the final four. He ran Kyle Larson high up the track to get the rookie out of his way to claim an 11th-place finish that put Newman in the Chase.I didnt take him out, Newman said. In a day or two, hell understand. Its hard to rationalize that, but I did what I had to do. I dont like racing that way.Gordon wound up missing the final by one point to Newman. He was tied with Harvick in the standings, but Harvick earned the automatic berth for his victory.Thats the system we have, Gordon said. I mean, I could have taken out Harvick, too, to make it in. But I didnt.Also eliminated Sunday were Matt Kenseth, who finished third, Keselowski, who needed to win to make it in but finished fourth, and Carl Edwards, who was 15th.It was a devastating blow for Keselowski, who won a race in each of the first two rounds of the Chase. But he fell into a hole because of a mechanical problem at Martinsville in the first event of this three-race round that he couldnt recover from despite strong finishes at Texas and Phoenix.His mettle was definitely tested, too, as his aggressive driving style angered his competitors and led to two fights in four races. He was fined $50,000 for his post-race behaviour at Charlotte last month — actions that caused Kenseth to jump him from behind in the garage — and he and Gordon were both bloodied when the drivers and the teams brawled on pit road after last weeks race at Texas.We gave it all we had, it was a strong run, it just wasnt enough to advance, Keselowski said. We did everything but win. We broke down in Martinsville and it was a huge hurdle to overcome and it was probably going to take a win. Fourth wasnt going to be enough, and we knew that coming in.What everyone else knew all weekend was that Harvick probably had the field covered.His win Sunday was his fourth of the season in his No. 4 Chevrolet and reaffirmed that hes very difficult to beat at Phoenix. Harvick swept the season here, has won four of the last five races and the last three fall races.His 2012 victory came the same weekend news broke he was leaving Childress at the end of the 2013 season, and his win last year provided one final hurrah with the only team hed ever driven for in the Cup series.You can pretty much sum this whole year up as Holy cow, Harvick said. Its definitely the best position that, myself personally, Ive ever been in.His competitors next Sunday all had to sweat it out to make it into the finale.Newman needed the last-lap pass, while Hamlin and Logano both had issues early in the race that forced them to come back from a lap down and then drive through the field. Hamlin finished fifth and Logano sixth.Hamlin, the defending winner at Homestead, loves his chances. He lost the 2010 championship to Jimmie Johnson because of a sub-par finish in the final, and he said hes far more prepared to handle the pressure this week.I feel pretty optimistic, said Hamlin, a one-time winner this season. Love it, love the opportunity. Were on house money now, so lets go have fun.Logano, a five-time winner this season, will be racing to give Team Penske a sweep on the season. Roger Penske already won the IndyCar championship in September, and now his young driver can make it 2-for-2.Its all about how good your team is, and I feel like Ive got the best team, Logano said. . According the CSNBayArea.com, the 31-year-old suffered an ACL injury in his right knee on Friday when he collided with Anaheims Emerson Etem during a pre-season game. . Advancing to the Champions League quarterfinals should be a formality after Lionel Messi scored a penalty and Dani Alves added a late second to secure a commanding 2-0 advantage over City in the round of 16 on Tuesday. http://www.cheapchinajerseysnfls.com/. Dont miss a single shot, live on TSN beginning at 7pm et/4pm pt. Winners of their last eight games, the Heat return to Toronto for the second time in the month of November. After beginning the season 4-3, allowing 100.9 points on 47 per cent shooting, Miamis resurgent defence has vaulted them back to the top of a weak Eastern Conference. . -- Los Angeles Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw was placed on the 15-day disabled list Saturday for the first time in his seven-year career because of a swollen muscle in his left upper back. . Pinch-hitter Tommy Medica singled in the go-ahead run in the eighth inning and the Padres beat the Seattle Mariners 2-1 in their first home game since Gwynn died of cancer Monday.LOS ANGELES – Ryan Getzlaf breaks into a big grin when asked about the agitating antics of his longtime linemate Corey Perry. "What? You want me to talk about that?" the Anaheim Ducks captain asks chuckling. After some gentle prodding Getzlaf opens up. "Thats part of Perrys game. I mean, hes always going to play hard, play hard between the whistles and, you know, theres always a little extra stuff going on and its stuff hes been doing his whole career. Its part of his makeup and things that fuel him to be a better player on the ice and I thought he was unbelievable [in Game 3]." On the ice, Perry is in the middle of everything. Rarely will a shift go by without him getting engaged physically with someone. "He is what he is," said Getzlaf. "Hes not out there chirping at every guy that skates by or anything like that. Hes just a bit of a rat out there, I guess, if you want to call him [that]. He stirs the pot and he does the things that he does and that helps make him a better player." What makes Perrys pest persona on the ice intriguing is that it differs sharply with the seemingly reclusive life he leads away from the rink. "Hes very, very quiet off the ice," said Ducks head coach Bruce Boudreau. "Hes actually shy around people. But on the ice hes one competitive man." "If you dont really know him off the ice hes pretty quiet, he really doesnt say too much," said Kings defenceman Drew Doughty, who lives around the corner from Perry in London, Ont. and was his Olympic teammate in February. "You kind of got to get to know him a bit more. Hes an awesome guy off the ice and I see him quite a bit in the summer, but on the ice hes just a pest out there. Hes a really good player and he likes to get under the other teams skin and when you put those two things together it kind of frustrates you." Perry was third on the Ducks with 65 penalty minutes in the regular season. He is fourth on the team in penalty minutes during the post-season with 15. And the Kings are wary of being goaded into taking retaliation penalties. "If he starts [agitating] after the whistle then Im probably going to ignore it, but if its throughout the game, hes going to try and hit me or whatever, Im going to try and hit him for sure," said Doughty. "You got to play physical on a guy like that. The only way you can beat him is physically. You got to play him hard and try and get under his skin too, because he gets frustrated at times." What makes Perry somewhat different is that hes a creative pest. His prank on Jeff Carter in Game 1 – squirting water in his Olympic teammattes unattended glove during a commercial break – went viral.dddddddddddd Someone even showed Boudreau the video on YouTube. It reminded the Ducks bench boss of when Perry sprayed water at Colorado Avalanche head coach Patrick Roy at the end of the first game of the regular season when the two coaches engaged in a shouting match. Perry also made it on to plenty of highlight reels earlier in the season. During a November overtime game in Carolina, the 28-year-old broke his stick and grabbed one right out of Alex Semins hands while skating back to the Ducks bench. Semin was hanging over the boards waiting to come on as part of a line change. "I dont know if hes trying to get under peoples skin or if hes just playing like hes been playing since he was six years old," said Boudreau. "I dont think hes a guy like [Stars forwards] Antoine Roussel or [Ryan] Garbutt, who purposely do things to tick the other person off. I think Corey just plays as Corey and if it ticks people off then thats an added bonus." Boudreau believes Perry needs to create chaos in order to be the effective 43-goal scorer he is. "The more youre on him and the more you hound him the more competitive he gets just like when I watch Doughty," Boudreau explains. "The more you hit him the better he gets." "If Im not doing different things," Perry said, "Im not going to be myself on the ice." But how does Perry explain the double life he leads? How is he able to morph from unassuming off the ice into an annoyance on it? "Theres a switch where, when I get to the rink, it flips on," the former Hart Trophy winner said quietly. "I can turn it off when I leave." NOTES: Perry and Getzlaf held a one-on-one meeting after the Game 2 loss to discuss why they werent as effective. "Luckily enough we dont have to have them that often," said Getzlaf. "Its not that often where both of us dont have a good game. Sometimes its one or the other and we can kind of pick each other up a bit. There were just some things we needed to do better. Its not like we were playing horrible or anything like that. It was just we needed to be better than we were and thats when you have those talks." The two responded with a strong effort in Game 3 as the Ducks got back in the series. Perry scored the opening goal of the game on the power play ... "We just got to take him out of this series," said Doughty of Perry. "Hes one of the key guys on their team and we havent done a good enough job against him yet so tonight [in Game 4] we got to pay special attention to that and take him out of the game." ' ' '