At halftime, the Panthers led 31-0, and the statistics began pouring in: no team has ever recovered from a 31-point deficit in the divisional round.
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The Panthers (16-1) will be home next Sunday night, January 24, against the Arizona Cardinals in the NFC championship game. The Panthers will host the No. 2 Cardinals on Sunday for a ticket to Super Bowl 50.
Unfortunately for the Seahawks, they dug themselves too deep a hole, and unlike previous year against Green Bay there was no onside-kick miracle this time around. Indeed, the entire first half played out like a Panthers highlight reel, from spectacular catches to daring escapes to smothering defenses to cute little fans getting footballs.
Russell Wilson was under constant pressure, being sacked five times. Seattle was down 14-0 before the crowd even had a chance to settle in.
Kuechly was far more alert, grabbing the interception and sprinting 14 yards to make it 14-0 only 3 1/2 minutes in.
Running back Jonathan Stewart scored the first touchdown of the game before linebacker Luke Kuechly made it 14-0 after he intercepted a Russell Wilson pass and took it back into the end zone. He calls it “Big Mo”, and there couldn’t have been a better example than Carolina’s 31-24 victory over Seattle on Sunday.
Then, Seattle showed its pedigree and climbed back within seven points. “But we came back in the right way, in the right manner with the right attitude”. Will Cam Newton keep the Panthers in front, or will the Seattle Seahawks find a way to prevail over Carolina?
Jonathan Stewart’s diving touchdown with 14:18 to play in the second quarter made it 21-0, and after Cortland Finnegan’s interception when Wilson was hit as he released a pass, the Panthers got a 48-yard field goal from Graham Gano for a 24-0 lead.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. – There was a changing of the guard in the NFC on Sunday at Bank of America Stadium.
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Fitzgerald had eight catches for 176 yards and a touchdown in the win over the Packers, but Palmer struggled most of the game with inaccurate passes. Steven Hauschka’s 36-yard field goal with 1:12 kept Seattle’s hopes alive. It required a great catch of an onside kick by Carolina linebacker Thomas Davis to prevent Seattle from its opportunity of invoking the name Frank Reich. The Panthers were moving on to the next round. He finished 16 of 22 for 161 yards. Those numbers helped him finish with a lofty quarterback rating of 108.3. Arizona is trying to reach its first Super Bowl since the 2008 season, when it lost to the Pittsburgh Steelers, 27-23. But they did their damage in the first half, and they did it while remaining patient. Seattle looked dazed and confused. That Oilers team gave up a 32-point lead to the Bills in the most epic playoff collapse in National Football League history. In what many anticipated would be the most competitive matchup this weekend, the Panthers ended the Seahawks’ two-year reign as NFC champions, withstanding Seattle’s furious second-half rally. Sure, quarterback Cam Newton was having an MVP-caliber season, and the team’s defense was among the best, but the Panthers also had one of the easiest schedules and they barely beat the New Orleans Saints and New York Giants, teams that had losing records.
