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WCNC BLOG |
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March 2008
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The team arrived at Bank of America Stadium just before 5:30 a.m. While the team was unloading the bus to a couple of dozen welcoming fans, those who made the trip to Seattle woke up to a cold, dreary morning. I ran into one father/son group in the upper deck of Qwest Field yesterday. They headed back to Kannapolis this morning at 5 a.m. After a blowout loss, the trip home can’t be pleasant. Also headed home today is Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory. He was on the sidelines for pregame yesterday. As he was walking down the field toward the end zone where the team was warming up Steve Smith walked up to him and said he wouldn’t disappoint the city. McCrory was pumped! First, he was excited that Smith approached him and they even got their picture taken together. But McCory was even more excited that the team may be headed to the Super Bowl. Obviously that didn’t happen. Fans started trickling out of the stadium in the fourth quarter. As I was running a tape to the satellite truck for them to feed what first half highlights we had, I saw two Panther fans hugging. They didn’t know each other. One said to the other, “That’s OK. Let someone else go to the Super Bowl. Let Seattle enjoy it.” As reporters rushed into the Panthers locker room for post game interviews you could hear a pin drop. While the players were happy they got as far as they did, they gave a lot of credit to Seattle and its coaching staff. Steve Smith said, “Everything that that team did today was superb. They outplayed us. They out hustled us. They overall flat out beat us.” “You’ve got to give them credit,” Delhomme said. “That’s a good football team. They’ve been the best team in the NFC all year. They played better than us today that’s for sure.” After the interviews were over, the team trickled out of the locker room one by one and headed to eat before they got on the bus to head to the airport. There was a buffet set up with steaming hot food and the players sat at tables set up right outside the locker room. There was a gate that led outside Qwest Field and fans were huddled in a little opening that gave them access to the players. They were blocked off by an iron gate and a few of the players stopped to say hello to many of the Panther fans waiting. But for the most part in was a quiet meal. I ran into Tom Sorenson from the Charlotte Observer in the elevator this morning. He said the one good thing about the blowout loss was he was able to start writing early. That’s one way to meet an East Coast deadline. |
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