Empty 20-play drive haunts Panthers

Sometimes this happens earlier in the season; other times, later.

The Chiefs’ defense is tops in the National Football League in interception percentage, but the club is just 20th in QB sack percentage.

And there’s no question they rose to the occasion. Sure, he had a false start penalty in the first half that was a drive-ender, but the good outweighed the bad.

But the Chiefs refused to go down without a fight.

“You can’t be up 17-3 at half, come out of halftime and have the ball and go on what felt like the whole quarter drive, have the ball on the 20 and not even attempt a field goal”, tight end Greg Olsen said.

Attributing a certain fire to some halftime speechifying that apparently included forecasting the play, Berry had gone back on the field in the fourth quarter still figuring the opportunity remained inevitable. But it was hard to imagine any comeback in the first quarter, when the Panthers successfully managed to set the tone against a shaky KC run defense. The Panthers emerged from a 20-play drive that spanned more than 10 minutes in the third quarter with zero points. Panthers LB A.J. Klein was pegged as a starter for the second week in a row for injured LB Shaq Thompson. Also in the first half, Newtonbecame the first player in National Football League history to pass for 20,000 yards and rush for 3,000 yards in his first six seasons.

While Newton has been the Panthers’ starting quarterback since Carolina took him with the first pick in the 2011 NFL Draft, Ford didn’t get immediate playing time after the Chiefs selected him at No. 23 in the 2014 NFL Draft. Carolina’s first drive ended with a field goal from Graham Gano, but only after Peters nearly intercepted Newton’s fluttering attempt on third down.

Passing defense: A. The Chiefs probably surrendered a few too many plays to get an “A” in this category, but considering the way the defense stepped up when it needed to – and actually scored seven points, to boot – those guys earned this grade on a curve.

Peters did cost the Chiefs a little bit by kicking the ball after the play was over.

Where the Chiefs’ defense has struggled has been in stopping the run.

If that and more comes to pass, remember that it hinged in great part on a player who just knew how to make things go the Chiefs’ way when everything else said it wasn’t meant to be.

Santos’ fourth field goal of the day split the uprights, lifting the Chiefs to their fifth straight victory and 17th win in their last 19 games.

Coming off back-to-back wins, are the Panthers a good bet to cover today against the Chiefs at 1:00PM ET in Charlotte? That’s when one of their defensive leaders, safety Eric Berry, stepped up.

“You can’t take back to back sacks”, head coach Ron Rivera said.

But Berry wasn’t done yet. This made the score 17-6. Chiefs lead series, 3-2. However, the return of Justin Houston to an already fearsome defense is the bigger news. But they could have had more. The Chiefs are winners of four straight and are 2-2 in road games this season, but it’s possible quarterback Alex Smith will again miss this game because of concussion symptoms.

Seemingly. Because that’s when things got weird.

Cam Newton took some heat from critics when he ripped into game officials two weeks ago after Carolina’s 30-20 win over Arizona, saying he didn’t feel protected in the pocket.