Carolina Panthers studs & duds from stunning comeback win over Atlanta Falcons

Now that's more like it. The Carolina Panthers looked like they were down and out early against the Atlanta Falcons, falling behind 21-7 at halftime. However, they battled back and finally got a great game from their franchise quarterback - leading them to a thrilling comeback win, 30-27 in overtime.

Let's review the studs and duds for Carolina from Week 11.

Stud: QB Bryce Young

Bryce Young was magnificent from start to finish today. On the first drive BY9 went 7/8 with a touchdown and a passer rating over 141. Young took a big shot on his second drive and aggravated his ankle injury, but he toughed it out and put together his best game of the season to date. In the end Young went 31/45 for 448 yards, three touchdowns and a 123.2 passer rating.

Stud: Panthers WRs

In a refreshing change, Carolina's wide receiver corps didn't consist of a whole lot of Tetairoa McMillan and pretty much nothing else. McMillan did score his third and fourth TDs of the season, but the Panthers also got big receptions from Jalen Coker and Xavier Legette along the way. Together, McMillan, Legette and Coker combined for 265 yards and three touchdowns. They would have had two more scores if not for a pair of brilliant deflections in the end zone by Atlanta's DBs.

Dud: RB Rico Dowdle

While the passing game was working, for the second week in a row, star running back Rico Dowdle just wasn't able to make the kind of impact that he normally does. In his defense, there's only so much any running back can do when 11 guys are keyed against him, but in any case Dowdle only finished the game with just 45 yards on 19 carries (2.4 yards per attempt).

Dud: Chandler Zavala

The responsible party for Bryce Young's injury appears to be the team's fourth-string right guard, Chandler Zavala. Before taking the hit, Young seemed to try to change protections, but for whatever rason Zavala did not block Atlanta's blitzer, who got a free path right to Young and briefly knocked him out of the game. Zavala was also flagged for a hold on the same drive. Later, Zavala stepped on Young's foot to kill a critical fourth down play.

Dud: Panthers run defense

While Carolina has greatly improved what was the worst run defense in the league last year, today they regressed in a bad way and got blown away by Bijan Robinson on the ground. From the very start they had no answer for Robinson, who had racked up 50 yards and two touchdowns before the second quarter was even half over. Robinson ended the game with 104 yards on 23 carries.

Dud: Panthers pass rush

Stop us if you've heard this one before. Carolina's streak of poor pass rushing performances continued this week, their game against the Jets still being their only solid game in this department. This week, Michael Penix was virtually unbothered in the pocket, taking zero sacks and just one QB hit until he was replaced by Kirk Cousins, who took no hits or sacks, either.

Dud: DC Ejiro Evero

Without pressure, zone defense is B.S. at this level. That's just the way it is. It doesn't matter who the other quarterback is or how pathetic his wide receiver corps might be. If you give him all the time in the world in the pocket, he's going to burn you. That's what the Falcons did for much of the day, while defensive coordinator Ejiro Evero kept calling zone after zone after zone - with one notable exception in the third quarter on a Tre'Von Moehrig blitz that worked out very well. There weren't nearly enough of those tendency breakers, though.

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