You don’t want to lose to the team that is clearly against the wall. The Carolina Panthers, however, did the opposite, allowing the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to post a 43-13 victory, their second this season. CBS analyst Pete Prisco couldn’t hold back his frustration over it.

“That was really a vile performance today across the board,” Pete Prisco said on NFL on CBS. “The team rushes for over 250 yards against you. You’re not tackling, you’re getting blocked, you’re not playing good football. You turn it over for a touchdown as Bryce Young did; you’re not playing good football. You turn it over, throw interceptions; you’re not playing good football.

“Why? They came into this game with two straight victories. They were going to take a real hold of the division, and they basically threw up on their shoes. Terrible performance. Terrible performance by the Carolina Panthers.”

This harsh take came in after Pete Prisco predicted a close game, picking the Panthers to win 24–23. He’d also noted that Bryce Young was in MVP conversation entering this game. But the Carolina QB threw for 163 yards, one touchdown, and two interceptions.

The Carolina Panthers struggled badly against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, especially with turnovers. Carolina allowed four, while the Bucs allowed none. And, the star of the show, RB Bucky Irving, rushed for 106 yards. Tampa Bay rushed for 258(!) yards in total, pretty much running amok in the Carolina defense.

It was a puzzling performance from Carolina, who had allowed only 81 rushing yards in the previous two games. But against the Buccaneers, the Panthers seemed to have no answer. Irving also added two scores; quarterback Baker Mayfield recorded only 64 passing yards!

As Sports Illustrated’s Mark Livingston put it, Carolina made a bad day worse. Right at the end of the first quarter, David Moore muffed a punt that gave the ball back to Tampa Bay, who set up a field goal in the second quarter after a 14-yard run and a few incompletions.

In the second quarter, Young threw a 50-yard pass to Darren Waller for a touchdown. But the extra point attempt was blocked by the Buccaneers and was returned for two points.

Young threw an interception to Zyon McCollum, who returned it to Carolina’s 32 yard-line. The Bucs scored a touchdown in the ensuing drive.

Simply put, the Carolina Panthers were outsmarted by the Bucs, and they shot themselves in the foot.

“I liked our calls,” Carolina head coach Dave Canales said. “We had good run calls to take care of some of that run game. It just really came down to execution. Came down to guys fitting their gaps, setting their blocks, and then containing the running backs.

“They [Tampa Bay] did a good job. Again, I can’t take that them away from that—being patient with their runs and trying to find voids. But it is stuff we have to look at. It’s stuff that we have to attack and something that we’ve made great strides in. But we can’t have setbacks like this.”

After the game, even Young accepted his mistake and highlighted where they went wrong against the Bucs.

“Obviously, can’t turn the ball over like that,” Young said. “It hurts the team, hurts the defense, all that stuff. A lot of that stuff is inexcusable. Of course, that’s on me. All in all, obviously a bad day. You got to be able to have a sense there; I didn’t see anything, and that’s part of our job.

We have to make sure that you have that sixth sense of knowing when someone’s coming and being able to protect the ball. … That’s always my fault.”

Now, after this tough loss, it will be interesting to see how the team holds up against the Packers.

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