They had some evidence of their improvement Friday night, in Luvu's play on fourth-and-1 from their own 8, stopping Bills running back Duke Johnson in his tracks. He came through with the kind of flash he's shown, and new safety Xavier Woods was there to help clean up the play. Woods laughed and said the entire defense feeds off Luvu's energy, and he's been here long enough to know to follow it.
"I just followed The Uce," Woods said, using Luvu's locker room nickname. "Uce got him low, and I got him high.
"We go out there to compete; you always want to do well. You build off that. It's a stepping stone to where we want to get to as a defense and a team."
"Man, we take pride in it as a defense, defending every blade of grass down there," Luvu said of the play. "Trying to challenge ourselves. As a defense, we take pride every time we step on the field.
"He (Woods) said on that play; he said, 'I was just following you.' I'm glad he did. Now I know that he's got my back."
Again, it would be a mistake not to point out the setting and the opponent and the calendar. But for all the strides the Panthers made last year, red zone defense was a consistent issue. So even if it was a preseason stop, there was something tangible about the boost that play gave them.
"You can build an identity on that," defensive tackle Derrick Brown said. "When your back's against the wall, nobody else to rely on but those 11 guys on the field, and you make something happen. . . .
"Our motto is, whoever we go against, we're going to give them our best. We're going to find our best. The last six weeks, we've been preparing, so we're going out to try to dominate, whether it's against ones or twos, just dominate the opponent in front of us."
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Key stop, turnover, shutout provide a "stepping stone" - Panthers.com
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