SONOMA, Calif. — For at least one weekend, Smoke was back.

Tony Stewart returned to victory lane for the first time in three years in vintage fashion — refusing to let Denny Hamlin steal a win at Sonoma Raceway away from him on the final lap Sunday.

Now he’s probably got a shot to run for a fourth NASCAR championship in his final season before retirement.

Stewart, mired in an 84-race losing streak dating to 2013, finally won to stop a slide of poor performances, injuries and personal turmoil that has tarnished the end of his career. He missed the first eight races of this season, his last as a NASCAR driver, with a back injury suffered in an off-road vehicle accident one week before the season opened.

It meant Stewart would have to win a race and crack the top 30 in points to have one last shot at glory before he stepped out of the No. 14 Chevrolet for good.

“My guys have been through this whole disastrous roller-coaster the last three or four years and never backed down. They’ve never quit on me. There’s days I’ve quit on myself,” Stewart said. “In this day of social media where everybody is a cricket ... on social media, they sit there and chirp, chirp, chirp, chirp until they are in front of you and then they don’t say a damned word.”