Young Gun ; So far, rookie Kevin Harvick has been more than impressive.

The deer-in-the-headlights look spoke volumes about Kevin Harvick. It said he'd rather be anywhere except where he was, which was at North Carolina Speedway on Feb. 23, being introduced as the man who would replace a legend.

``Nobody ever said life was easy,'' Harvick said at the time, ``but this is the hardest thing that's ever happened in my life.'' He steeled himself before going on. ``But we're a pretty tough team and this is what Dale would have wanted. We're going to make it happen and hope he'll be proud of us.''

In that moment the 25-year-old native of Bakersfield, California, became one of NASCAR's most watched and most popular drivers. It fell to him, with the unqualified support of team owner Richard Childress and 190 employees, to pick up the GM Goodwrench banner and carry it forward.

It wasn't supposed to be this way. Harvick was supposed to polish himself with another season in the Busch Series before graduating to Winston Cup next year. But that changed on Feb. 18, when Dale Earnhardt died on the last lap of the Daytona 500. Two nights later, at a meeting with Harvick and several of his valued employees, Childress asked Harvick if he'd drive for Earn-hardt's old team.

There was one condition. ``The only hesitation was that I didn't want it to be the black No. 3,'' Harvick said. ``But that was the general consensus among everybody on the team. That was the only thing I had a question about. I told Richard I'd do anything he wanted me to do for the team.''

Childress never had any doubt Harvick should be his man. ``When it happened [Earnhardt's death], we had to maintain our foundation, which is the Goodwrench team,'' Childress said. ``Dale and I knew the kind of driver we'd want whenever he retired. Kevin's that kind of driver, which is why we had set up a seven-race deal for him this year with AOL. He was going to drive our third car last year. It just happened sooner than anybody expected. He's really talented and knows what he wants in a car. It's our job to give him what he wants.''

Crew chief Kevin Hamlin's main worry was that fans would expect too much too soon, thus putting even more pressure on the young rookie trying to fill Earnhardt's shoes. ``Everybody needed to realize it wasn't going to be an easy deal,'' Hamlin said. ``I wanted to make sure everybody knew how hard it was going to be. As things have turned out, though, it's been extremely easy. So far, things have worked out pretty good.''