Week 15 Game Preview: Panthers at Bills

Dec 16, 2021 at 10:12 AM

Will Bryan

Game Reset

History: Carolina vs. Buffalo

Carolina is 2-5 all-time against Buffalo, including a 1-2 record on the road
Carolina's only win at Buffalo came in 2005 on a fourth-quarter game-winning catch from Michael Gaines
Current Streak: Panthers W1
Last matchup: Carolina won 9-3 on 9/17/17 at home

Notable Connections

Panthers

Panthers assistant general manager Dan Morgan spent three seasons in the Buffalo front office from 2018-20.

Bills

General manager Brandon Beane and head coach Sean McDermott both spent time in Carolina as assistant general manager and defensive coordinator
A number of assistant coaches, including Heath Farwell, Bobby Babich, Ken Dorsey, Eric Washington, Ryan Wendell and Leonard Johnson, spent time with the Panthers
Six players on the active roster, Mario Addison, Vernon Butler, Star Lotulelei, Efe Obada, Andre Smith and Daryl Williams, previously played for the Panthers

Team

Carolina has not allowed a TD on the opponent's first drive in any game this season, the only team in the league with that distinction. The last time a team went a whole season without allowing an opening drive TD was the 2016 Pittsburgh Steelers.
Carolina has 65 tackles for loss (t-5th) and 32 sacks (t-10th) this season.
In the first quarter, Carolina has a +49 scoring margin, best in the NFL. Carolina's average time of possession of 9:13 ranks fourth in the NFL.
Carolina's duo of Haason Reddick and Brian Burns currently have 18.5 combined sacks. That's the most for Carolina through 13 games since Julius Peppers/Mario Addison had 19.0 in 2017.

Individual

DJ Moore ranks seventh in the NFC with 938 receiving yards, while his 10 receptions of 50+ yards are tied for most in the NFL since 2018.
Taylor Moton is tied for second in the NFL with just one sack allowed, while his PFF grade of 73.9 ranks seventh among NFC linemen.
Reddick is fourth in the NFC with 10.5 sacks, while Burns ranking third among NFC defensive linemen with 8.0 sacks.
Stephon Gilmore leads all cornerbacks with a PFF grade of 90.0, allowing a passer rating of 34.3 when targeted.
Jeremy Chinn currently leads the Panthers with 91 tackles. His 207 career tackles are the most of any player from the 2020 draft class.

Milestones in Reach

Cam Newton

Needs eight passing or rushing touchdowns to tie Steve Young (275) for 18th in the NFL Super Bowl era.
Needs five rushing first downs to pass Terry Allen (429) for 30th place among all players in the NFL Super Bowl era.

DJ Moore

Needs 62 receiving yards for his third-straight season with 1,000 receiving yards. Only Steve Smith (2005-08) and Greg Olsen (2014-16) have had three consecutive 1,000-yard receiving seasons in franchise history.

Haason Reddick

Needs one game with at least 1.5 sacks to BREAK the franchise record of five games with multiple sacks in a single season (Kevin Greene, 1999; Charles Johnson 2012)
Needs 4.5 sacks to tie Kevin Greene (1998) and Greg Hardy (2013) with the franchise record of 15.0 sacks in a season

Brian Burns

Needs 3.5 sacks to tie Thomas Davis (28.0) for eighth all-time in sacks in franchise history

Jeremy Chinn

Needs nine tackles to reach 100 on the season. He would become the third Panther (Luke Kuechly, Jon Beason) with over 100 tackles in each of his first two seasons, according to press box statistics.