NEW ORLEANS — There was no way to find a positive in that. So they didn't bother trying.

The Panthers knew that the offensive display they put out Sunday in the regular season opener wasn't what they hoped for, or expected, or had planned for.

So, as they walked out of the Caesars Superdome following a 47-10 loss to the Saints, all they could do was swallow hard and prepare to watch a tape when they got home that wouldn't feature many highlights.

"Of course, you want to come out and start off on a high note. That didn't happen today, and you know, that's tough," quarterback Bryce Young said after a day that would have been his worst passer rating of last season (32.8), when things were awful. "We're going to wear that today. We're going to learn from it. We turn the film on tomorrow but that doesn't define us. It's obviously a long year. And we have to attack it with urgency and make sure that we're urgent about cleaning things up and fix what we've got to fix."

There is plenty to fix.

The Panthers gained just 193 total yards on the day, 11 first downs, and were 1-of-10 on third downs. After talking about running the ball all offseason, and investing in the personnel to do it, they had just 58 net rushing yards. Young was sacked four times.

Those are numbers that were obviously reminiscent of last year, but so much has changed. The general manager (Dan Morgan), the head coach (Dave Canales), the offense and offensive staff he brought with him, and a big chunk of the roster (23 of the players on the 53-man roster weren't here in 2023).

That made the shock of what happened even worse and the lesson more stark.

"Coach did a great job of talking about that and kind of addressing that," veteran wideout Adam Thielen said. "Like this isn't last year, and we did, we started out in a way that looks like last year. But this is a new team, this is a new roster. This is a new coaching staff, this is a new organization, and we're not going to go back to last year. So I think there's going to be a sense of urgency when we get back in that building to say, how can we do that? How does that look?

"I think you just don't know who you are until you start playing real games. So we found out who we were today, and we're not going to let it define us."

Young is obviously going to be the focal point after the way things fell apart — the first play of the Dave Canales era was an interception, which he described as an "overthrow" toward new wide receiver Diontae Johnson. But the breakdowns were systemic.

"I mean, we just didn't give him a lot of opportunities, right," Thielen said. "A lot of times, it was a guy running free to sack, or it was maybe not getting open or whatever. Again, football is the greatest team game there is for a reason. Now, quarterbacks still get a lot of money and, and so they get a lot of scrutiny. But shoot, defensively, special teams, offensively, we didn't play well enough to give us opportunities to be successful.

"So, that's what happens when you don't do that."

The guys running free was a protection issue that several players said could be cleaned up from film, the kind of communication issues that come with so much new. And not being able to run the ball to back the Saints off the line wasn't pragmatic when they scored instantly and on their first nine possessions. It might be just the first game of a 17-game season, but that was a small consolation in the moment.

"When you start in a 10-0 hole, you're going to be in a bad position, right?" center Austin Corbett said. "You've just got to keep battling, keep your head down and keep working from there, and you know, you've got a lot to clean up. It's just part of that. You're going to get hit in the face in life. I mean, you've got to be able to embrace that and accept that adversity and move on.

"That's the, the double-edged sword of it. You're like, oh yeah, it's Week 1, but as a competitor like that does not feel good at all. We got our butts whooped tonight in all three phases."

There were reasonable questions about the preseason, in light of the first offense playing exactly one series in Buffalo (and they were without two line starters for those 12 snaps). But the breakdown Sunday was so thorough that it was hard to see that as a reason.

"I feel like you use preseason for like penalties and stuff, you know what I mean?" right guard Robert Hunt said. "But I just think we just got our ass kicked today. You know what I mean? That's what, the truth be told. We just got whooped in every phase and we've got to do something, man. Hopefully, we can change that.

"This is a bad feeling, you know what I mean? So we've got to come to work tomorrow and change it, man. We can't be OK with this."

The relentlessly upbeat Canales was also coming up with few good explanations for what happened. He described the atmosphere in the locker room as "somber" — as it should be — and emphasized the need to take an honest look at the film when they got back home and continue to work for the next 17 weeks.

"It's a long journey, it's a long journey to become us," Canales said. "I truly believe that. I knew that whether we started 4-0 or 0-4, whatever that is. What I knew is this is going to take a long time to become us. You've known me a little bit now, but I just can't help but know that you have to have adversity to become who you're going to be. For guys to pull together, to show their character the way they did today in a really tough loss and call it what it is.

"Again, it's, it's one loss. Now we have a chance to come back to tighten things up and to work together."