The “Red Rifle” was red-hot on Sunday as Andy Dalton and the Carolina Panthers shocked the Las Vegas Raiders on the road in a 36-22 victory for the team’s first win of the season.
One of the biggest storylines this week was Dave Canales’ decision to bench the Panthers’ 2023 No. 1 overall pick, Bryce Young, in favor of Dalton at quarterback after a horrific 0-2 start in which the offense couldn’t get anything going.
Well, the Panthers are going to have more Young questions to answer after what Dalton was able to do in Canales’ system, and it came immediately for Carolina to start this game in Sin City.
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Dalton, knowing the Panthers scored just 13 combined points in its first two losses on the year, led a nine-play, 70-yard drive that was capped by running back Chubba Hubbard’s six-yard pass for the touchdown.
It was the first touchdown by a position player on the Panthers this season as Young was the only scorer in garbage time in Week 1 against the New Orleans Saints. And Hubbard played a major role in this offensive outburst, finishing the game with 114 yards on 21 carries while catching five passes from Dalton for 55 yards.
But this game wasn’t a blowout from the get-go as Gardner Minshew and the Raiders matched the Panthers’ opening-drive touchdown with a 10-play, 97-yard drive in which Alexander Mattison punched it in from two yards out to knot it up at 7 apiece.
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But the wheels fell off for the Raiders when Dalton responded on the ensuing drive, this time finding his leading receiver on the day, Diontae Johnson, for a five-yard score to take a 14-7 lead. Johnson had eight catches for 122 yards.
Then, after some back-and-forth by both offenses, Dalton fired his third touchdown pass of the first half, this time hitting veteran receiver Adam Thielen, through a tight window between two Raiders defenders for 31 yards and a 21-7 lead with 21 seconds left in the second quarter.
Thielen suffered a hamstring injury on the play and didn’t return for the rest of the game after notching three catches for 40 yards.
In the second half, Dalton continued to put together scoring drives for Carolina.
After back-to-back field goals on the first two drives of the second half, Dalton picked his way down the field with chunk plays by Johnson and Hubbard. And after 11 plays and 84 yards, Miles Sanders busted into the end zone to make this a blowout in Las Vegas, 33-7.
The Raiders showed a little life on the ensuing drive as Minshew found Jakobi Meyers for a 13-yard touchdown. Meyers finished the game with seven catches and 62 yards.
However, Minshew’s next drive saw an interception on the second play from scrimmage as he and Davante Adams (four catches, 40 yards) were not on the same page.
That led head coach Antonio Pierce to bench Minshew in favor of Aidan O’Connell, who got his first snaps of the new year. He would lead a garbage-time touchdown drive in which Tre Tucker, the team’s leading receiver with 96 yards, found the end zone to make it 36-22.
But all signs were pointing to the Panthers, a team that many believed was on track to have the worst record in the NFL again this season, collecting its first win of the year, showing that the move to bench Young was the right call for this week.
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