Denver Broncos def. Carolina Panthers: 5 Quick Reactions

The Denver Broncos held on to win on opening night over the Carolina Panthers 21-20 in a fitting thriller to start the 2016 NFL season.

There were a lot of twists and turns throughout the game including big turnovers, questionable calls, penalties and momentum swings. Everything football fans could hope for. Here is a quick series of reactions from the game and why in ended up going the way it did.

Panthers again got away from running

A better way to put this is they got away from running with their Pro Bowl running back. Too many times they not only dropped back to pass against one of the best secondaries in football, but they also ran Cam Newton 11 times in the game. He was exposed to way too many hits while Jonathan Stewart got just 15 touches despite averaging better than four yards per carry. It was the same problem in the Super Bowl. They got too cute with the play calling.

Kubiak ground attack is in full gear

Meanwhile Gary Kubiak finally got to put in his full offense that he’s become known for since the 1990s. Needless to say it was effective as its always been, particularly running the football. The offensive line created lanes all night for C.J. Anderson and really controlled the flow of the game. Denver finished with 148 yards rushing against one of the top front sevens in the league. That’s an accomplishment.

Broncos defense is still good but…

In the end the pass rush and the secondary did enough to close out the game, though they almost blew it with a bad penalty at the end. At the same time, it felt like the aggressive blitzing of Wade Phillips cover up the fact that the Broncos defense didn’t look similar to the unit that finished last season. Clearly there were gaps left behind by Malik Jackson and Danny Trevathan that were felt. It’s still an upper echelon unit, but doesn’t feel like the dominant force from 2015.

Trevor Siemian didn’t blink

Somebody will look at the stats and believe Trevor Siemian played terrible on opening night. At times that’s true, but it should’ve been expected from a kid who was the third string quarterback last year. He’s never played a regular season game. Even so at times he looked calm and poised on the field. He delivered some solid passes included a well-timed screen and also ran for some big first downs. Cutting down on the interceptions will be the priority moving forward.

Graham Gano made a classic kicker mistake

It’s not the first time such a thing has happened, but Graham Gano fell into a trap that has doomed more that a few kickers over the years. Up until the final seconds he’d enjoyed a perfect evening kicking on both field goals (2-for-2) and extra points (2-for-2). Then on the last play his first kick that was waved off because of a Broncos timeout drifted right. It hit the right goal post and went in. Unfortunately on the next attempt he tried to adjust to where he wouldn’t do that again. He overcompensated and the kick hooked left. Let that be a lesson. If it went in, don’t mess with the formula.