What looked to be an serviceable night for Jerry Coons, Jr. took a turn for the worse late in Friday’s Carb Night Classic 100-lap feature.

Now, the short-track veteran is unsure of his championship hopes moving forward.

Coons was running inside of the top five in the United States Auto Club (USAC) Silver Crown Champ Car Series feature at Lucas Oil Raceway when a flat tire brought the Tucson, Arizona native to a stop at the entrance of Turn 3, forcing the race’s second yellow on Lap 73.

“I kind of got high once in traffic there,” Coons told Short Track Scene. “I don’t think I hit anybody, but I must have picked up something high off the groove up there. It took me a while to know. The car started getting tight, sliding the right front. Then it picked up a vibration and I knew what it was.”

The Gene Nolen Racing driver made his way to pit road to replace the tire, but was trapped multiple laps down. Coons had risen only to ninth in his No. 20 machine when the checkered flag flew on Lap 100.

“It’s just unfortunate,” Coons said. “We weren’t spectacular, but I think we were kind of locked into a top five which is what we needed for points, so this definitely hurt us in the overall scheme of things.”

The Arizonian entered Friday’s event second in points, 18 markers behind Kody Swanson and only six ahead of defending champion Chris Windom in third. However, Swanson led all 100 laps in a dominant victory, and Wisdom finished only three spots back in fourth.

Suddenly, Coons finds himself third in the standings, 48 points behind Swanson and nine markers back from Windom.

“This was big,” Coons said. “(Chris) Windom had a good finish, and (Kody) Swanson dominated. With the number of races we have and the competition these guys bring, you really can’t give up one race. This will hurt for a while.”

However, while Coons may feel that his championship chances took a significant blow on Sunday, recent experience tells Swanson that the fight is far from over.

“It’s a long season,” Swanson told Short Track Scene. “We had a good points lead at the beginning of last year and had an unfortunate situation, something broke at Gateway (Motorsports Park) that really took us out of it. We didn’t lose the championship until Eldora (Speedway), but that race took a lot of points from us. We just need to do the best we can every race and let the chips fall at the end.”