The ball game itself was fairly close throughout with the Panthers having the lead only at 14-10 early on. They trailed at halftime and never did reclaim the lead from an underachieving club reeling from the shocking off-field events of the last 36 hours. The Chiefs, with little to lose this year, went for a TD instead of an easy FG on 4th down with 3 seconds left in the first half. TE Tony Moeaki caught Quinn’s first TD pass of the day on the play where Moeaki was all alone in the back of the end zone.

Cam had a pretty good day statistically, going 15-for-27 for 232 yards and 3 TDs. He spread the ball around nicely, completing passes to 8 different receivers on the day and a TD pass each to Steve Smith, Greg Olsen, and Louis Murphy.

Unfortunately for the Panthers, an underachieving quarterback had an even better day. Brady Quinn, a first-round pick originally with the Cleveland Browns, had only 4 incompletions in 23 attempts for 201 yards and 2 TDs.

The Panthers’ run defense didn’t fare much better as Jamaal Charles went over 1,000 yards on the season with a 27 carry 127 yard day. Carolina’s offense outgained the Chiefs’ 385 to 355 but couldn’t stop a surprisingly efficient team.

The pass defense, ranked surprisingly high overall this year in yards given up per game, wasn’t up to the task as Quinn fired completions in-between Jamaal Charles’ 5 yards per carry average and couldn’t come up with a turnover as both offenses took care of the football.

If not for a late 5-yard penalty on the Chiefs, it would have been the first time in the franchise’s long history where they’d have had no turnovers or penalties in a particular game.

Rivera will undoubtedly find a job as someone’s Defensive Coordinator for 2013, but after this game I’d be shocked if he’s Carolina’s coach next year.

Carolina Panthers:
Total Offense: (T-19) 339.8 yds/game
Scoring Offense: (25) 19.5 ppg
Rushing Offense: (18) 108 yds/game – 3.9 yds/att
Passing Offense: (16) 231.8 yds/game – 8.3 yds/att

Total Defense:
Scoring Defense: (21) 24.1 ppg
Rushing Defense: (25) 126.2 yds/game – 4.5 yds/att
Passing Defense: (11) 220.9 yds/game – 6.9 yds/att

Kansas City Chiefs:

Total Offense: (21) 336.2 yds/game
Scoring Offense: (32) 14.6 ppg
Rushing Offense: (4) 145.6 yds/game – 4.6 yds/att
Passing Offense: (29) 190.5 yds/game – 6.2 yds/att

Total Defense:
Scoring Defense: (28) 27.4 ppg
Rushing Defense: (24) 126.1 yds/game – 4.5 yds/att
Passing Defense: (10) 219.9 yds/game – 8.3 yds/att

Carolina Panthers RB Jonathan Stewart is out again so DeAngelo Williams should get 15-20 carries with Mike Tolbert getting 5-10 touches/targets running and receiving. Cam should get his 7-10 carries as well but the totals will depend on the pace of the game. If you’re in a fantasy league and have DeAngelo Williams benched, you might consider him in a flex position or one of the RB positions depending on your RB strength and depth and the matchups your other backs face.

I highlighted above some of the statistics that jumped out at me – namely passing yards per attempt on offense and defense for both teams. Carolina holds a very strong edge there.

Despite the fact that so many people are walking and talking on eggshells with the Jovan Belcher tragedy, let’s just face facts – as ugly as they may be:

The bottom line is the NFL is all about winning. The Panthers’ coaches can, should, and will take advantage of the loss of one of the Chiefs’ starting ILBs and pound the rock up the middle to test whoever they decide to start in the vacated ILB spot. We’ll get a chance early on to see if the Panthers are particularly successful with their running game which has been struggling all season long. If successful, then that will set up the play-action pass, where the Panthers have the ability to create some big plays and the Chiefs give them up on defense if you look at yards per attempt.

When the Chiefs have the ball, they’ll probably look to really shorten this ball game with the added reason of the tragedy on mind…if they can shorten the game with their one strength – running the football – it will improve their chances of winning. The Chiefs tend to run to the strong side a lot so look for SLB James Anderson to be very active in this contest.

With an understandably distracted KC team, it’s hard to say what effect it will have on their play. Will they come out flat and play uninspired with all the heavy hearts or will they channel their anger and frustration and focus it on hitting the guy in front of them in the mouth when the game begins? How long will they be able to keep it up if they do?

Difficult to tell, as the Indianapolis Colts played inspired football in beating the Green Bay Packers after finding out their Head Coach was battling cancer. It’s a completely different situation, but both have a similar effect in that it introduces a unique distraction in the minds of everyone on the field from the long snapper to the starting QB to the coaches.

Overall, with the Panthers following up the best game of their season so far from last Thursday, they also have the advantage of the extra-long week to have prepared and heal up over the Chiefs.

Final score?

Panthers 38, Chiefs 13