A 31-0 lead at halftime was too much for the Seattle Seahawks to overcome despite a ferocious comeback bid and the Carolina Panthers held on for a 31-24 victory in a Divisional round matchup.
The first half explosion was the first time in the last decade a team entered halftime with a lead of more than 30 in the playoffs. In the eight times it had happened in history, no team had even come close to blowing the lead. While the Seahawks scrambled to make it a close game in the second half with 24 unanswered points, there just wasn't enough time to finish the comeback.
Carolina established the tone of the first half on the very first play from scrimmage with Jonathan Stewart rumbling for 59 yards, which set up a short rushing touchdown for Stewart just three plays later. Russell Wilson's first pass of the game was then returned for a touchdown by Luke Kuechly to give the Panthers a 14-0 lead less than four minutes into the game.
Seattle continued to struggle to find offensive rhythm, while the Panthers extended the lead with touchdown drives of 15 and 9 plays, as well as a 48-yard field goal set up by a second Wilson interception. In the regular season, Wilson threw just eight interceptions and led the NFL with a passer rating of 110.1, but his costly errors in the first half afforded Carolina a huge lead and Cam Newton took advantage.
But the second half was a different story.
After Tyler Lockett returned the second half kickoff 50 yards, Wilson connected on four consecutive passes, including a 13-yard touchdown pass to Jermaine Kearse that got the Seahawks on the scoreboard. A quick stop was followed by another drive led by Wilson that ended with a 33-yard touchdown pass to Lockett.
While the Seahawks needed 16 minutes to find a third touchdown, the defense kept the Panthers off the scoreboard and eventually cut the lead to just 10 with six minutes remaining when Wilson found Kearse in the back of the end zone.
But the Panthers managed to milk more than three minutes of clock before punting to the Seahawks again and that was too much for Seattle to overcome. While Wilson successfully led a fourth scoring drive in the second half, a failed onside kick sealed the Seahawks' fate.
Ultimately, a decision to attempt to convert a fourth down inside the red zone late in the second quarter instead of a 35-yard field goal proved costly, as did a 55-yard miss by Steven Hauschka as time expired in the first half. Would the Panthers have been so conservative with three minutes remaining in regulation if the lead was only seven? It's a game of hypotheticals, but the Seahawks passed on three points in the first half and came up one possession short.
A win for the Seahawks wouldn't have set the record for a postseason comeback. That still belongs to the Buffalo Bills when they managed to overcome a 35-3 deficit in the 1993 playoffs to beat the Houston Oilers in overtime. It would have been the first comeback from a halftime deficit of at least 30, though.
With the win, the Panthers advance to play host to the Arizona Cardinals in the NFC Championship. The Cardinals won an overtime thriller against the Green Bay Packers on Saturday, but were eliminated by the Panthers in the playoffs last year when Ryan Lindley managed just 82 passing yards against the Carolina defense.