How the Carolina Panthers can take over the NFC South lead in Week 8
And just like that, the Carolina Panthers control their destiny in the NFC South.
Following the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ loss to the Baltimore Ravens on Thursday night, the Panthers climbed one step closer to controlling the NFC South division race by the midway point of the season.
The Buccaneers — after losing three consecutive games, including a Week 7 loss to Carolina — are now 3-5. The Panthers, given last week’s win against the Buccaneers, own a tiebreaker against Tampa Bay and head into a weekend showdown in Atlanta with the Falcons on Sunday.
The winner of the matchup between the Falcons and the Panthers at Mercedes-Benz Stadium will hold the lead in the division through eight weeks.
The Panthers (2-5) come into the Week 8 game with a 2-0 division record, so a win against the Falcons (3-4) would give them additional padding against the NFC South heading into the second half of the campaign. Additionally, the Falcons are already 0-2 against division opponents, making this matchup very important for their division-title hopes as well.
The Panthers and Falcons are set to battle twice in three weeks. The second matchup — a Week 10 Bank of America Stadium battle on “Thursday Night Football” — is Carolina’s lone prime-time matchup on the schedule.
While the NFC South has the worst overall success rate among the NFL’s eight divisions, the Panthers are equipped to take advantage of the waning competition’s ineptitude.
The Panthers are 1-1 under interim head coach Steve Wilks, and while questions about fire sales and tanking have emerged in the wake of last week’s trade of running back Christian McCaffrey, the Panthers have a relatively manageable schedule throughout the remainder of the campaign.
Below are the remaining games on the Panthers’ regular-season schedule:
Week 8: @ Falcons (3-4)
Week 9: @ Bengals (4-3)
Week 10: vs. Falcons (3-4) TNF*
Week 11: @ Ravens (5-3)
Week 12: vs. Broncos (2-5)
Week 13: BYE
Week 14: @ Seahawks (4-3)
Week 15: vs. Steelers (2-5)
Week 16: vs. Lions (1-5)
Week 17: @ Buccaneers (3-5)
Week 18: @ Saints (2-5)
The Panthers have just three future opponents with winning records through seven weeks — the Ravens and Buccaneers are the lone two teams with eight weeks of work — along with four division games still on the slate.
Wilks, who is working to convince Panthers owner David Tepper to give him the keys to the permanent top job, could — in theory — lead the Panthers to a division title in an awful division. That outcome could be enough to land the long-term position.
Following the firing of Matt Rhule, Tepper said Wilks would be considered for the permanent head-coaching gig if he did an “incredible” job. Tepper also frequently brought up the idea of “getting over the hump,” a notion that he defined as winning more than the year before and showing tangible progress in doing so.
During the Rhule era, the Panthers won five games in back-to-back seasons. Rhule received 16- and 17-game slates to accomplish that win total.
Wilks has been given 12 games to prove himself, and with a wide-open division race and a relatively underwhelming slate of opponents, the deck could inevitably be stacked in the interim head coach’s favor.
This story was originally published October 28, 2022 at 12:13 PM.
