The Panthers have worked for sixteen weeks. Gathered an 11-4 record. Endured injuries to their pass catching core and offensive line. Beaten three of the four NFC playoff teams. Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady, Matthew Stafford and Matt Ryan have all fallen to the Carolina Panthers in 2017. They’ve grinded for 16 weeks to clinch a playoff berth, but their future is anything but clear heading into their season finale in Atlanta; even a win to finish the season with 12 wins won’t guarantee them anything but a trip to a hostile environment in the wild card round.
In a stacked NFC, their two losses to New Orleans earlier in the season have them relying on the Saints to lose their fifth game of the season in Tampa Bay to give the Panthers any hope to move up the standings. While the Panthers will be focusing in on the Falcons this Sunday, they’ll need the 4-11 Buccaneers, currently eight point underdogs, to pull off an upset over the division-leading Saints in order for the Panthers result to mean anything at all.
That’s right. The Panthers winning or losing on Sunday will have no bearing on their playoff seeding if the Saints win in Tampa Bay.
A Saints win over the Buccaneers will have the Panthers as the fifth seed in the NFC no matter what happens at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, so one might think that the Panthers will be a little bit distracted by the events happening an eight-hour drive south at Raymond James Stadium.
But you’d be wrong.
“We’ve got to focus on the game we’re playing,” Russell Shepard said when asked if he would be tempted to peak at the 1,075-feet long by 58-
“The opportunity that you worked your butt off the whole year, it’s gone.”
Ron Rivera agrees with the sentiment that the game on the field in Atlanta is the only one that matters; when the NFL changed their December 31st schedule to have almost every game that matters for playoff seeding begin at 4:25 EST, they eliminated the opportunity for a team to know it’s destiny before the game even begins. Now that the games that will determine the NFC South champion kick off at the same time, Rivera has insisted that he will play the Panthers starters and key players for the entire game.
“The league has set it up so that what’s going to happen is that you have to play,” Rivera said when asked whether he would consider resting his players. “Anything could happen. I don’t know what the scenarios are, but I think the most important thing is that we focus in on Atlanta. We can’t get caught up in what the scenarios could be; we’re not going to worry about those, we’re going to go out and play with the intent of winning the football game.”
So nobody’s going to be paying attention to the Saints game?
“Somebody else paying attention to it, absolutely,” Rivera admitted. “Me paying attention to it or any of our players or coaches makes no sense, but yes, we’re probably going to have somebody that’s going to pay attention to it, but it’s not going to approach the way that we’re going to approach this game.”
“We’re going to approach this game to win, obviously, and we’ll see what happens from that point.”
The Panthers will be facing a hungry Atlanta team, who can earn a playoff berth of their own with a win over the Panthers; the team is well aware that they will have their hands full with a group that is literally fighting for their season on Sunday; a loss to the Panthers combined with a Seahawks win over the Cardinals would eliminate the Falcons. Matt Ryan is currently 11-8 in his career against the Panthers, but 7-2 when playing in his home turf in Atlanta.
“They have to win to get in, so they’re going to bring everything they’ve got. These guys deserve our full attention and we’ve seen what they’re capable of. We’ve got to lock in and make sure that we’re focused on what’s important.”
-Luke Kuechly
What will happen if the Panthers win depends entirely on the Saints. A Saints loss will open the door for the Panthers to move up the standings; they can climb as far as second place with a first-round bye, depending on the results in Minnesota and Los Angeles. While a Saints win would render the Panthers result moot, Cam Newton is so focused on the Falcons he didn’t even know the NFL had flexed the Saints to 4:25.
“They did? Oh, I didn’t know,” Newton said when told the Saints game that has so much to do with the Panthers playoff seeding had been moved by the NFL. “We’re just going to control what we can control, and everything else will be taken care of.”
