By Reid Spencer, Sporting News NASCAR Wire Service

FORT WORTH, Texas — Carl Edwards held off tenacious Brad Keselowski to win Friday night’s O’Reilly Auto Parts 300 at Texas Motor Speedway.

The victory was Edwards’ second at Texas, his first of the season, the 30th of his career and the first for the new Ford Mustang in the NASCAR Nationwide Series.

Keselowski crossed the stripe .482 seconds behind Edwards. Paul Menard came home third, followed by Joey Logano and Elliott Sadler. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. finished eighth and retained the series points lead.

Kyle Busch, who was gunning for his third consecutive win and fourth of the season, was chasing Edwards as the two battled for the lead on Lap 88 when the No. 52 Chevrolet of Tim Schendel blew a tire and slid up into Busch’s path. With no room to maneuver and no time to react, Busch slammed into the back of Schendel’s car, knocking Busch’s No. 18 Toyota out of the race.

“We started out a little bit tight, and the track was actually coming our way a little bit,” Busch said. “It started to free up a little bit that last run right before we wrecked. We felt pretty good about it. We were just biding our time. We were just running there—we were running hard, but we were just running.

“It felt like we were probably the only car that was going to give Carl a shot. It’s a shame that we didn’t have the chance to race it out the rest of the night.”