Carolina Panthers players take it 1 game at a time; coaches plan ahead

For the 9-0 Carolina Panthers, life may seem glamorous, but that’s not necessarily the case.

The next week and a half will see the Panthers face a surging Washington team and then travel to Dallas to face a Cowboys team on Thanksgiving that should have its Pro Bowl quarterback returning to the lineup.

Victory Monday at Bank of America Stadium, though sounding sweet, saw about 35 players come in for various treatments to remedy the nicks and bruises that are inevitable by Week 11.

Panthers coach Ron Rivera has long held to his one-game-at-a-time mantra. But with three games in the span of 12 days, it’s tough not to peek ahead at least a little.

“It’s not going to affect the players in terms of their mental process,” Rivera said Monday following Carolina’s 27-10 win against Tennessee. “To the players it’s more about what they need to do and focus on. But for the coaches, it’s going to be a little bit of planning for the next two weeks, knowing that we’re prepping for Washington. But at the same time you’ve got to create a little bit of time as a coach – especially a position coach – for next week.”

The Panthers’ coaching staff likes to think of the season in quarters. They went 4-0 before the early bye. They repeated the record in what was considered before the season to be the toughest stretch of the schedule with Seattle, Philadelphia, Indianapolis and Green Bay.

Now comes the beginning of the third quarter. Rivera reminded the team throughout last week not to pay attention to what was being said outside the building about the Titans game.

He’ll issue that same reminder this week when the Panthers will be favored again to beat Washington at home.

“Everybody was locked in,” receiver Ted Ginn Jr. said after the win. “We knew what this game meant. We knew this could have been a trap game for us. They wanted it to be a trap game. The refs put us in a dogfight a couple of times, you know. We just kept fighting and got up out of it.”

Tuesday is the players’ official off day, but Rivera expects half the team will still come to the stadium to receive treatment. Wednesday, the work for the game against Washington will begin in earnest for the players.

Rivera will again dial back the practice. Usually one of the biggest practice days, Wednesday will be lighter. They’ll exchange practice periods with installation periods, and the Panthers will hope to finish a half-hour early like they did last week.

Behind the scenes, assistant coaches will begin chop up tape of both Washington and Dallas. The offensive assistants will get a feel for what the Cowboys’ defense likes to do to opponents in third-and-long situations or what their personnel is on certain plays, for example.

After Sunday’s game, the coordinators will go back to their office and burn the midnight oil on Cowboys’ prep.

Meanwhile, the message to the players is clear. Only focus on the next game.

“The first challenge is to not worry about three games in (12) days. Just worry about (Washington). That’s the message we’ll have for our players,” offensive coordinator Mike Shula said. “I know it’s cliché, but they’ve really done a nice job of having blinders on and being locked into this week. Coach has a good plan and we follow his plan in regard to the physical part, the mental part.

“The thing that helps us is we’ve got smart guys, who might not have to get physical repetitions on the plays during the week because we feel comfortable with them knowing what to do. If it were called on game day they would execute it like they had reps on it during the course of the week. That helps.”

This story was originally published November 16, 2015 at 7:40 PM with the headline "Carolina Panthers players take it 1 game at a time; coaches plan ahead."