DT Cullen Jenkins
December 16, 2015
Q: Is there something different or special about playing a team that has a zero on the other end of their record? You don’t do that every year this late in the season.
A: Yeah, you don’t see that much and for us, we have to pride ourselves on feeling like we can play and compete with anybody in this league. We have, for the most part. We had a chance to win every game that we’ve been in at the end, except for the Philadelphia game. For us, we’ve just have to go in and know that it’s going to be a game, it’s going to be a physical game, but it’s going to be a game that we can also win if we do what we’re supposed to do.
Q: You almost beat an undefeated team earlier this season, the Patriots. Does that game sort of give you a little extra confidence going into this?
A: Yeah. Like I say, it’s just with everybody we’ve played, we played well. With everybody, we’ve competed with everybody, but the thing that we have to do is just finishing the games. We’ve proved that we can compete with people for three quarters, but what we haven’t proved is that we can finish games on a consistent basis.
Q: Is there a strong belief in here that you guys can do that? I’m sure there has to be some teams in the league who look at the Panthers and they probably know that we’re not as good as them. It doesn’t sound like you guys will go into that game thinking that way.
A: We know the sky is the limit for us. Like I said, we can compete and we can play with anyone, but it’s just a matter of finishing. Everybody has to take on the challenge mentally, physically, and we can’t make mistakes, and we can’t beat ourselves.
Q: What’s the key to containing Cam Newton?
A: A lot of keys. The guy has a rocket for an arm, he’s athletic, hard to tackle, his running ability. I’d say he’s probably the best running quarterback in this league, and you add that with his ability to pass and get the ball down the field, and then with the running game as well. They have a lot of weapons and this will be the toughest offense, most complete offense, that we’ve played.
Q: Is it something special to go against an undefeated team?
A: Yeah, definitely it is. They’re at the top of the league with the way they’ve been playing, the way they’ve been able to win games, and every game that they’ve played, they’ve looked just as good as the other. For us, especially on the defensive side of the ball, and I believe when coach put the statistics on the board, I think they scored at least 20 points in every game this year. Defensively we have to take that as a challenge and try to keep them from putting those points on the board.
I was at Tmobile and they had them locked behind glass as someone told them you were in the vicinity of the mall