3 winners and 3 losers from Carolina Panthers win vs. NY Jets in Week 1
By Jason Huber
Carolina Panthers second-half offense
With defense dominating in the first half to put the Carolina Panthers ahead 16-0 at the break, all the team needed to do in the second was score a few times to pull away even more for a blowout victory over the New York Jets.
However, the Panthers’ offense completely stalled in the second half after it looked like things were about to get clicking.
In the first half, quarterback Sam Darnold threw for 234 yards on 17 completions, along with a passing and rushing touchdown. In the second, it looked like offensive coordinator Joe Brady went back to being much more conservative with the play calls as the signal-caller threw for only 45 more yards and Carolina managed a solitary field goal.
The Panthers also failed to score a touchdown in their one red zone attempt in the second half and played as if they were just trying to maintain the lead rather than to add onto it.
Carolina’s offensive drives went as follows: Punt, punt, punt, field goal, punt, end of the game.
The longest drive among those sequences was 12 plays, in which Christian McCaffrey ran the ball five times and Darnold attempted mostly screen passes.
That’s not how you win games in the NFL and something has to be fixed before they play a much-better New Orleans Saints defense in Week 2.