Home, sour home: Panthers lose third straight in Charlotte, this time to Seattle

If you’re going to be any good in the NFL, you need to win most of your home games.

For the Carolina Panthers, though, that’s just not happening.

Seattle edged the Panthers, 30-24, at Bank of America Stadium on Sunday, taking a big early lead and then holding off a late Carolina challenge.

The Panthers have now gone 2-5 at home this season, including losses in their last three games in Charlotte. The first two of those defeats came to Atlanta and Washington, two of the worst teams in the NFC. This one, at least, was to a very good Seattle team headed to the playoffs.

Still, the Panthers haven’t given their fans much to cheer about this season.

“Very frustrating,” Panthers safety Tre Boston said of the team’s homefield record. “You’ve got to give the fans something to see. Something to be joyful about. Something to get them going back to work happy about. We can’t go out there and get slapped up. We’ve got to give them something.”

Christian McCaffrey scored two of the Panthers’ touchdowns, bringing his total to 18 for the season. But the Panthers (5-9) fell to their sixth straight loss anyway as another fourth-quarter comeback fell short. They haven’t won since Nov. 3.

Panthers quarterback Kyle Allen had another uneven day, throwing three interceptions — all to Seattle linebackers. A fourth pickoff of Allen — one that would have gone for a Seattle touchdown — was overturned after an official review. But Allen then led back-to-back touchdown drives in the fourth quarter, cutting a Seattle lead from 30-10 to 30-24 with a furious comeback.

Seattle (11-3) scored touchdowns on each of its first three offensive drives, as the Panthers defense seemed helpless to stop Seahawks quarterback Russell Wilson. The Seahawks’ offensive pace then slowed considerably — Seattle wouldn’t get another touchdown until the fourth quarter — but Carolina ultimately didn’t score enough to make it matter.

▪ I really didn’t like the Panthers not trying an onside kick with about three minutes left and down 30-24. Kicking the ball deep there — that’s a lot of pressure on the defense. Even with two Seattle holding penalties, Wilson was able to convert a third-and-11 to Tyler Lockett, and the Panthers offense never saw the field again after Chris Carson (133 rushing yards, two TDs) ran for another first down. Seattle ran out the game’s 3:14.

Panthers interim coach Perry Fewell decided against the onside kick. Why? “We felt like they would be ready for the onside kick,” Fewell said. “They saw that three or four times last week.”

▪ We’ve found one thing McCaffrey doesn’t do so well — throw the ball. McCaffrey’s first NFL attempt ever worked out well, when he threw a 50-yard touchdown pass against New Orleans in 2018. In this game, though, McCaffrey took a long lateral from Kyle Allen in the third quarter and then fired a ball at least 15 yards short of a well-covered Chris Hogan. McCaffrey is now 1-for-3 passing in his career after another incompletion earlier this season.

Perhaps it was wise that McCaffrey threw the ball into the ground, though. When Seattle tried its own gadget pass, wide receiver Josh Gordon threw one deep into double coverage and had it intercepted by Boston.

▪ Gordon’s interception ended up putting $150,000 in Boston’s pocket. It was his third interception of the season, which made a $150,000 contractual bonus kick in, according to ESPN’s Field Yates.

▪ No one has ever doubted Joey Slye’s leg strength, and he showed it again Sunday. Slye’s 52-yard field goal in the third quarter was his seventh of 50-plus this season, a new franchise record from that distance in a single season (Graham Gano had six in 2013). Slye is now 7-for-10 from 50-plus yards this season and has recovered nicely from his nasty game in New Orleans three weeks ago.

▪ One of the worst plays of this game for the Panthers: A strip-sack of Wilson, where Carolina recovered a fumble, was nullified when defensive tackle Gerald McCoy was called for being offsides on the play. Instead, Seattle scored a TD on the drive.

▪ The Panthers had team doctor Robert Heyer bang the “Keep Pounding” drum Sunday. Heyer, who is retiring after this season, has been a Panthers team doctor since the team’s inception in 1995. The Panthers announced that he has never missed a game — Carolina will have played exactly 400 regular-season games by the end of this month.

▪ Nice to see Cam Newton at the game Sunday. Newton sat in his family’s skybox with his children. The Panthers quarterback was recently named the team’s Walter Payton Man of the Year nominee due to his charitable work. Newton established his own foundation in 2012, and since its inception it has provided $5.13 million in grant funding and year-round programming resources in Atlanta and Charlotte.

This story was originally published December 15, 2019 at 4:09 PM.