CHARLOTTE — Let’s not wait 10 years to do that again.
It’s been a decade since the Carolina Panthers hosted a playoff game, and the franchise tried to cram a whole generation worth of memories into Saturday’s wild-card game against the heavily favored Los Angeles Rams.
The teams, seemingly, tried to play an entire game in the final 15 minutes, a fourth quarter that featured four touchdowns with the lead changing hands after each one.
It was the Rams, led by likely MVP Matthew Stafford, who scored last. Stafford found tight end Clayton Parkinson for a 19-yard score with 38 seconds remaining, capping the back-and-forth finish and earning a 34-31 victory.
“In this league, there are no moral victories,” Carolina head coach Dave Canales said. “Today is not a proud moment of losing this opportunity, but it’s about a team that came together to play really good football and to battle.”
There are no moral victories, but there are memories.
And the Panthers, which last reached the playoffs in the 2017 season, haven’t created many of those in recent years, stumbling through coaches and quarterbacks and ineptness and opposing fans taking over Bank of America Stadium
Saturday, however, was a memory maker — for fans too young to remember the good times and for fans old enough to want to relive them.
There was the return of Cam Newton, the franchise’s iconic former quarterback who reached a detente with the organization and pounded the drum pregame and electrified the crowd that still marvels over his feats. The day, which included pictures with owner David Tepper, seems likely to pave the way for Newton to be inducted into the team’s ring of honor and his No.1 jersey officially retired.
Current quarterback Bryce Young will never make anyone forget Newton. There is no comparison between the former No. 1 overall picks, but Young proved this season and, again, Saturday in his first-ever playoff game that he can play. He didn’t get to add to his 12 game-winning touchdown drives, but Young twice drove the Panthers for go-ahead touchdowns in the fourth quarter, shaking off a first-half interception.
The thought was the Panthers needed to play mistake-free football to hang with the high-powered Rams. And early they did not. A failed fourth-down try and Young’s interception gave the Rams short fields, which they converted into an early 14-0 lead.
“We don’t pass judgement on the game early on,” Canales said.
Which translated from its native coachspeak means “keep pounding.”
And that’s what the Panthers did, even after a muffed punt at 17-7 late in the second quarter seemed to be the final blow. Suddenly, it was the Rams making mistakes — Stafford missing an open Davante Adams down the left sideline, Puka Nakua (maybe the best player in football) dropping a would-be touchdown pass that hit him right in the hands.
Young’s 16-yard dash to the end zone cut the deficit to 17-14 just before the half and reignited the imagination and energy of the fans.
Forget for a moment that Carolina backed into the playoffs at 8-9, having lost its final two games and needing the rival Falcons to put them in the playoffs. Forget that the Rams were 10.5-point favorites and expected by most observers — this one included — to dominate the Panthers.
There would be 30 more minutes to decide who was moving on, 30 more minutes to make memories, 30 more minutes to dream.
And the Panthers made sure each one of those minutes matters. They tied the game at 17 on the first drive of the second half. And then the lead changes started. A field goal by the Rams put them up 20-17, but cornerback Mike Jackson intercepted Stafford, who was not at his best, setting up Carolina’s first lead of the night. Chuba Hubbard’s short TD run – after a 52-yard pass from Young to receiver Jalen Coker – put the Panthers up 24-20.
Stafford hit Kyren Williams for a 13-yard score to put the Rams back up 27-24.
But the Panthers weren’t done even as the clock ticked to less than five minutes remaining. Isaiah Simmons blocked a punt, and Carolina recovered at the LA 30. Four players later, Young found Coker in the end zone for a 31-27 lead.
In Coker (nine catches, 134 yards and one touchdown) and rookie Tetairoa McMillan (five receptions, 81 yards), the Panthers found weapons to surround Young this season.
This is what the hundreds who lined up for a live taping of Newton’s podcast early Saturday morning wanted, what the thousands who filled the streets around the stadium for music and drinks and excitement Saturday afternoon wanted, what the 73,000 inside the stadium wanted.
This is what they missed during the Panthers’ lost decade. The nervous pit in their stomach, the anticipation of not knowing, the roar. One more stop. One tipped pass. One holding penalty to stall a drive.
But Stafford and Adams and Nacua and the Rams had other ideas. They marched 71 yards in seven plays – all passes, just one incomplete – against a Carolina defense missing cornerback Jaycee Horn (concussion). Stafford found Parkinson near the end zone, lofting a ball and giving him a chance to haul it in. He did.
Young and the Panthers had no miracle left when they got the ball with 32 seconds left. His final four passes fell incomplete.
“I’m so proud of the way everyone responded to adversity, whatever it may be,” Young said. “The way we fought, the way that we always stuck together, the way that we were always onto the next.”
The next is now the offseason. And will Panthers pick up his fifth-year option for 2027 (ESPN’s Adam Schefter reported yes)? And what will they do in the draft? And free agency? The Panthers need more talent. They were the only playoff team without a first- or second-team All-Pro selection.
But the next is also let’s do this again. A drought broken. A streak started?
“When we came here as a staff our whole goal was to create a brand of football that we could be proud of, and that’s what we’re doing,” said Canales, who just ended his second season in Carolina.
“We’re building something from the ground up, from the basics, from the technique and all that and just trying to build the right way. I’m just so proud to bring that to Panther fans, to bring them a brand of football that they enjoy watching, that they can connect with, and it brings the community together.”
For a franchise that’s spent the better part of a decade trying to get here and a fan base that’s felt the weight of that wait, a night like Saturday – even in defeat – leaves you wanting even more. Next year, not next decade.