I think this will be a blow out by Carolina. Just considering the conference championship games as a standard measure, both AFC teams played really bad offensively. Brady threw 2 bad picks and was less than 50% on completion rate. Manning was just barely over 50% and had less than 200yds. Neither team ran the ball worth a nickel.
Even with Denver's D being as dominant as it was the game came down to missed extra points.
With an eight point lead and the clock on their side Denver could not will themselves to get a single first down and that kept giving the Pats chances to come back, which they did sans 2pt conversion.
I just can't see the Denver D being as dominant against the Panthers. If only because Newton can run around/over/through defenders. And with this being the pinnacle game of their sport I highly doubt he will be reluctant to run if it means victory.
On the other side, Carolina's D is better than New England's D. Their front 4 will be able to get pressure without blitzing. Their corners aside from Norman are pedestrian but Manning cannot exploit them with deep passes. He can still muster up a deep ball here and there but his accuracy deep is highly questionable. The only real concern for Carolina is whether Thomas Davis will be able to play and if he does can he tackle well enough.
I see this being a relatively close game (within 10 pts) most of the way but as Denver gets more desperate as time becomes a factor they will force Manning to throw, leading to pics, leading to blowout.
Somewhere along the lines of 31-13.
Who are you pulling for and who is going to win it?
