Review-assisted interception became a pivotal swing in Panthers’ loss

“Yeah, I mean it was definitely a game of momentum today,” linebacker Devin Lloyd said. “Especially coming out at halftime trying to ride those highs, obviously the interception, crazy how just the sequence and how that happened.

“But ultimately it’s our job to put out the fire. We’re firefighters, and we don’t ask how the fire happened; it’s just going out and getting it out, and that’s the way we look at it, trying to do our job and make a play to get the ball back to offense.”

Going from up 21-13 to down 19-14 was one swing, but the emotional swing carried over, with the Broncos adding another touchdown to go up 26-14. The Panthers scored another touchdown to narrow the gap and had the ball with a chance to win late, before a strip-sack-fumble ended it.

But that moment loomed large.

“It’s really tough, and we preach refocus, right?” Fortner said. “So, trying to refocus is tough, but we get paid to do it, right? So we’ve got to do a better job. All right, something bad happened. Just worry about the next one.”

And now, after their third straight loss which dropped them to 3-5 (though still tied for first in the NFC South prior to the Bucs’ game late Sunday).

“I think it was kind of the name of the game for this game was kind of climbing out of adversity,” Tremble said. “Of being down 10-0 and being able to claw our way back to the lead and then have that play happen but still trying to be in the game, be competitive, and we did it all the way up until the end of the game.

“So, I think that kind of shows the mentality of the team no matter what’s going on. We’re going to keep trying to find a way, and so I think as long as we have that kind of mindset and have one less of those kinds of bad plays, we can go out there and win games.”