CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Dave Canales doesn’t know how the experts come up with betting odds that have the Carolina Panthers a 10.5 underdog in his first playoff game as an NFL head coach.
Nor is he worried about it as the Panthers (8-9) prepare for Saturday’s wild-card game against the Los Angeles Rams (12-5) at Bank of America Stadium.
“I’m sure they have algorithms for us,” Canales said on Monday of the odds. “We’ve just got to worry about playing our best football. That’s been the pursuit.”
Canales also has personal experiences that don’t allow him to get bogged down in being a heavy underdog.
The first happened on Nov. 30 when Carolina was a 10- to 10.5-point underdog to the same Rams at home. Quarterback Bryce Young, coming off a season-low 13.7 total QBR in a Monday night loss to the San Francisco 49ers, threw three touchdown passes in a 31-28 victory.
The other happened in a 2010 playoff game. Canalas was the wide receivers coach for the Seattle Seahawks, who won the NFC West with a losing record (7-9), similar to Carolina this year in the NFC South.
The Seahawks were a 10.5-point underdog to the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints in a wild-card game in Seattle. They won 41-26 in a contest defined by running back Marshawn Lynch, who took his “Beast Mode” nickname to another level with a 67-yard fourth quarter touchdown run in which he broke nine tackles to seal the upset.
Canales witnessed it from the coaches’ box at the then-Quest Stadium, which was literally shaking because of the crowd’s reaction.
“That’s why I’m so excited about us bringing football back to Bank of America Stadium,” Canales said of the Panthers’ first playoff game since 2017. “Our fans … they’ve caused some issues for offenses communicating, false starts, delay of games, different things like that.
“That is a real advantage.”
Back to “Beast Quake,” an advantage Canales recalls vividly.
“We were all yelling so much,” he recalled of the Seahawks staff. “The stadium was actually swaying. The whole building was moving. I popped up on my feet … I was yelling so loud when I sat back down after the touchdown I almost fainted.
“Like, all the blood had rushed to my head.”
Canales, 44, is hoping for similar moments in Carolina’s first home playoff game since 2015, ironically a 31-24 victory over the Seahawks in which Canales still was the receivers coach at Seattle.
He’s hoping Rico Dowdle, who had some “Beast Mode” type runs early in the season, and the ground game help provide those moments after a season-low 19 yards in Week 18 at Tampa Bay.
But mostly he’s hoping to get the fans as fired up at BOA as they were in Seattle in 2010.
“Just an amazing memory, an electric moment,” Canales said. “And I’m really excited to create some memories and moments here at Bank of America Stadium.”
