New Orleans defense stymies Carolina in crunch time

In a game where both the New Orleans Saints and Carolina Panthers put up more than four hundred yards of total offense, yesterday’s NFC wildcard match up came down to defensive stops in the red zone.
The Black and Gold scored four touchdowns while holding the opposition to four field goals, thanks in large part to the front seven being in Cam Newton’s face all game long.
On Sunday it was bend, don’t break for the Saints defense who allowed Carolina six trips inside their own 25-yard line only to surrender 16 total points once the field got shorter. Now as usual, Cam Jordan has a lot to do with that and after the game he had a little something special to give to the other Cam. “We won! The last drive of the game we decided to dominate. At the end of the day I try to tell people look, you beat the Carolina Panthers three times in a year I’m going to have to send this guy a wine bottle. I appreciate him for being that good old quarterback. We got him a nice little bottle of wine, no it’s not mine. But I have been drinking it for years. So I’m going to send him some sauce.”
Linebacker Manti Te’O said, “It wasn’t just that fourth down stop, you know? It was Cam coming up and applying that pressure and getting that intentional grounding call. And so it’s just a bunch of big time players making big time plays in big time situations.”
Safety Vonn Bell said, “You’ve got to stay poised, you have ice in your veins. You’ve been prepared for this moment, you’ve been here before. The defense has been on the field to win the game, so why not win this game?”
“It’s a speechless moment, like I said. And going out there and playing for your brothers and just making those plays in this atmosphere in this city, man. Hey, it’s just a speechless moment, like I said.”
With the win, Saints are heading to Minnesota for the first time since the regular season opener when the storyline was all about Adrian Peterson’s return to play the Vikings. Now, he is obviously no longer with the team so the storyline now is whether or not New Orleans and Atlanta can both win next weekend to make sure the Saints get back to the Superdome to host the NFC championship game.
The Saints lost that first meeting with the Vikings by the final count of 29-19.