By admission and by design, Carolina Panthers head coach Frank Reich and offensive coordinator Thomas Brown kept their play-calling a tad vanilla in last Saturday’s preseason opener. But tonight’s performance brought a little more of a different taste.
In the response to their scoreless, 199-yard outing against the New York Jets, the Panthers woke up on Friday—piecing together 19 points and 235 yards in their loss to the New York Giants. After the game, Reich told reporters that his offense gave a stronger and slightly more open account of themselves.
“I thought it was better,” Reich said. “We did a little bit more. We still didn’t do a ton, but we did some more. We did some more stuff. We had a few plays, had an opportunity for a few more.
“I thought Thomas did a great job of calling the second half. Happy with his development there. He’s a really sharp guy, now. He’s super sharp. Thought he did a great job in the second half when he had an opportunity.”
Reich was then asked if he still kept the play-calling generic, even despite the step forward.
“That didn’t feel like that to me,” he said. “Did we do everything that we do? No. There’s a lot more that we can do. We did a couple things in this game that we didn’t do the first game.”
One of those things included scoring, as Carolina got themselves a pair of field goals from kicker Matthew Wright and two touchdowns—one on a 1-yard punch-in from running back Raheem Blackshear and the other on a 20-yard catch from wideout Gary Jennings.
So, will we get even closer to chocolate next Friday in Detroit? (Don’t count on it.)
