KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- Kyle Larson left everyone in the NASCAR Cup Series Chase dejected Sunday after scoring maximum points in a dominant win at Kansas Speedway.

Larson won the first two stages, ran the fastest lap of the race and won, scoring a maximum 76 points Sunday. 

Although Larson dominated, he struggled in traffic and nearly lost because of it. With 30 laps to go, Chase Briscoe passed him and appeared to have the race won.

"I thought, 'he [Briscoe]'s just going to stretch out' but I got some lines going where I could just kind of settle in and try to take care of my tires," Larson said. "I could see he started getting really loose."

Larson stayed with Briscoe as the handling of his No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota went away. He passed him with seven laps to go and secured a perfect race.

"Yeah, that was fun. That was such a such a good day, Max points. I was gonna be happy with a second with how the race went but to get the lead, that's a big deal for the points. I'm proud of my team." Larson said.

Larson now leads the championship points standings by 26 over Denny Hamlin, who finished second and third in the stages and third in the race. 

"Just didn't quite have it today. I was hanging around where we could be really good in the long run but the short run the five [Larson] was really good. The two [Cindric] was good and we just couldn't quite hold those guys off or keep them close enough in the short run. And obviously at the end there... just not enough time and track position obviously to gain a few spots there at the end," Hamlin said. "That's kind of what we have third-place car, driver and everything today."

Bell sits third in the standings, 50 behind Larson. Bell also ran well -- sixth overall and two stage finishes of fifth -- but still felt dejected after Larson's run.

"We're gonna need to win three of these races if we want to get to him," Bell said, matter of fact. "We're just not good enough and we need to get better."

Briscoe had a chance at passing Larson and winning to put the Chase field 20 points closer to the points lead than they finished. In contrast to Larson, however, Briscoe said being in clean air actually hurt his car. 

"When we did the green flag pit stop and I got it in the wall so many times, I had a little bit of a bent toe link." Briscoe said. "I was actually better for me to be in second, just being behind him. With how much he used aero blocking, it would just tighten me up and it'd help me to actually be a little bit better. And then, as soon as I get the lead, I'm just going really, really free again."

Briscoe lost the lead with seven laps to go, practically watching the bottom fall out of his championship hopes.

"I just felt like I had to win in there to staying attention for a championship and obviously now losing 123 points back, it's probably not gonna happen."

On the final lap, Hamlin passed Briscoe for third after Austin Cindric passed him for second. Cindric arguably had the fastest car all race, finishing third and second in the stages and running down Larson in various runs. Larson even acknowledged Cindric's run in his frontstretch interviewing, saying he was "flying" after holding him off by just 0.565s. 

"It's one of the best race cars I've driven. It was a ton of fun today. The guys came really well prepared and. Um, yeah, I just feel like that cycle could have gotten better for worse. I feel like, you know, just the way it all played out with three cars coming in front, and um, I flipped through the box a little bit, having some stuff on my tires." Cindric said.

Ryan Blaney and Bubba Wallace each took advantage of staying out longer during the final green flag pit cycle to finish fifth and eighth, respectively. Between the two of them, only Blaney earned stage points. He finished 10th in the first stage and seventh in the second.

TOP-10 FINISHERS (LAP 267): Kyle Larson, Austin Cindric, Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, William Byron, Chase Elliott, Bubba Wallace, Ryan Preece.

Tyler Reddick finished 11th. While it wasn't a good finish compared to his win in the spring, it was far better than what he was destined for when he fell from 15th to 34th at the start. 

Other Chase drivers finishing outside of the top-10 included Daniel Suarez (14th), Ty Gibbs (17th), Joey Logano (20th), Chris Buescher (27th) and Carson Hocevar (33rd).

Gibbs and Logano scored points in each stage but faded at the end of the race. Gibbs finished ninth in each stage while Logano finished sixth and eighth in the stages after starting on the pole.

Hocevar earned seven stage points in the first stage. However, a wreck about midway through the second stage took him out of contention to earn points. 

STAGE ONE TOP-10 (LAP 80): Kyle Larson, Denny Hamlin, Austin Cindric, Carson Hocevar, Christopher Bell, Joey Logano, William Byron, Chase Elliott, Ty Gibbs, Ryan Blaney.

This was only the second time in the Chase where Chase drivers swept the top-10 spots in a stage.

STAGE TWO TOP-10 (LAP 165): Kyle Larson, Austin Cindric, Denny Hamlin, Chase Briscoe, Christopher Bell, William Byron, Ryan Blaney, Joey Logano, Ty Gibbs, Brad Keselowski.

NEXT: Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Oct. 4 at 5:30 p.m. ET (USA, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90, PRN affiliates).