Keep a close eye on this one
Panthers making a habit of holding on for dear life
Cruise control is killing the Panthers.
They will play host to the Cardinals on Sunday in the NFC championship game, and they are the best team in football through three quarters … but then they tend to coast.
They built a 31-0 lead in the first half against the Seahawks last Sunday in the divisional playoffs, but Seattle answered with 24 points in the second half.
That’s a trend for the Panthers, who had leads of 17, 23, 28 and 31 points in other games this season and saw each of them finish as one-score games.
“Guys were playing with their butts tight, coaches with their butts tight and at one point, the fans and myself were butt-tight too,” Panthers quarterback Cam Newton said of Sunday’s comeback bid by the visiting team.
Coach Ron Rivera suggested people might be making too much of the Panthers taking their foot off the accelerator and not giving enough credit to the teams that mounted those comebacks.
“I’ll be honest, I get it, I understand. But shoot, we won those football games, and look who we played against,” Rivera told reporters this week. “If this was someone that was 2-14 that did this to us, then I’d be really concerned. But it wasn’t. Am I concerned? Yeah. But are these things correctable and fixable? Most certainly.
“Let’s stay focused on what we did. We did some really good things. ... And we won the football game.”
Running on empty: Even after losing Chris Johnson, the Cardinals had a strong running game this season, finishing eighth in yards per
game with 119.8. But in the finale against the Seahawks and the playoff opener against the Packers, the Cardinals struggled to gain
yards on the ground, generating a combined 67 yards on 32 carries.
The play of the offensive line was especially poor in
those games.
“It’s not anything David is doing,” coach Bruce Arians said this week, referring to rookie running back David Johnson.
“There’s just not a lot of holes there and we have to do a better job. It’s a tough challenge this week.”
The Panthers are stout against the run, ranking fourth this season with a stingy average of 88.4 yards per game.
Farmer ’s pick: Even though the Cardinals haven’t gotten solid play out of their offensive line the last two games, and expected sloppy conditions could further hamper the ground game, they match up well against the Panthers. Carson Palmer has an array of speedy receiving threats who can challenge that defense. The Panthers have fewer receiving weapons, and that could allow the Cardinals to put an extra defender in the box to stop the run.
Cardinals 27, Panthers 24.