Etienne’s 71-yard jolt flipped the game — and the mood
One crease, one cutback, and Travis Etienne Jr. turned a quiet first half into a highlight reel. The Jacksonville Jaguars star blasted through a backside lane for a 71-yard sprint, the signature snap in a 91-yard march that Brian Thomas Jr. finished off to make it 17-3 with 1:50 left in the half. It was the play that broke the Panthers’ leverage and broke open the game.
Everything about the run showed what Jacksonville has been chasing on offense: vision at the line, a second gear in space, and the ability to punish a defense the moment it loses gap discipline. Etienne pressed front side, planted, then exploded through daylight. Once he hit the second level, the angle was gone. Four plays later, Thomas — the rookie wideout prized for his size and speed — cashed in from short range, and the Jaguars jogged to the locker room with control.
The scoreboard said 26-10 by the end, but the tone was set by a physical front that made Carolina’s day long and Jacksonville’s decisions easy. Etienne closed with 143 rushing yards, the kind of total that tells you the Jaguars didn’t just scheme it up — they owned the line of scrimmage. When the run game churns like that, the offense breathes. It also kept Trevor Lawrence out of harm’s way.
Lawrence was steady and selective. He hit a touchdown, avoided the big mistake, and kept the tempo right after a 1-hour, 16-minute lightning delay that could have scrambled rhythms. Before the stoppage, Jacksonville led 10-3. After, they looked even more composed. That’s where new head coach Liam Coen’s imprint showed up: a clear plan, quick answers, and a willingness to lean on what was working instead of forcing the flashy call.
Coen’s first NFL win ended with a game ball from owner Shad Khan. He downplayed it — pointing back to the locker room — but that’s part of the point. The Jaguars didn’t win because of a single tweak. They won because the big pieces intact from last year meshed with an approach that stayed on schedule and didn’t blink through a weather delay.
Defense set the floor; the new guys made sure it held
Jacksonville’s defense spent most of the afternoon turning Carolina’s possessions into chores. The renewed secondary clicked early when Jourdan Lewis undercut a route and got just enough on a ball to spring Foye Oluokun for a first-half interception. It wasn’t a gaudy, tip-drill moment — it was a veteran play that tilted field position and pace. From there, the Panthers were playing uphill.
Eric Murray’s presence showed in the little things: rallying from depth, finishing in space, and closing windows on checkdowns that usually buy quarterbacks breathing room. The pass rush didn’t need to live in the backfield to change the math; it condensed throwing lanes and forced Carolina to settle. That’s how you hold a team to 10 points without running up a sack total — squeeze the pocket, win early downs, and make third-and-long feel inevitable.
Up front, the Jaguars tackled cleanly and won leverage, which meant Carolina’s run game never had the chance to slow the clock or steal back momentum. Every time the Panthers tried to stack plays, the drive frayed — a batted ball here, a stuffed inside zone there. The margin for error shrank, and Jacksonville’s offense kept piling snaps while the defense stayed fresh.
The offensive line deserves its own line of credit. They passed off stunts, protected edges, and gave Lawrence time to work through progressions. You could see it in the third quarter especially, when Jacksonville leaned into body blows — inside runs, quick hitters — to bleed minutes and keep Carolina chasing. It wasn’t flashy football. It was winning football.
That weather delay easily could have cut the wire. Instead, Jacksonville came out of the locker room like the plan never paused. The staff tightened the rotation, the run game stayed hot, and the Panthers never found the quick-strike series that would have flipped the script. Momentum is fickle after long breaks; the Jaguars refused to hand it back.
For a Week 1 debut, a few takeaways feel sticky:
- Etienne as a tone-setter changes everything — when he’s a threat to house a cutback, defenses play on heels.
- Brian Thomas Jr. is already more than a red-zone target; his timing and feel in tight spaces showed up on a pressure-packed drive.
- Liam Coen kept the offense balanced and quarterback-friendly, especially after the delay — a promising early tell.
- The newcomers on defense, Lewis and Murray, fit the urgency Jacksonville needed on the back end. Oluokun’s interception was the punctuation.
- Jacksonville controlled both lines of scrimmage, which is how you build a 26-10 cushion without inviting chaos late.
The Panthers will circle missed chances and stalled series, but this felt more like Jacksonville’s plan executed than Carolina’s plan unraveled. The Jaguars created the explosive, protected the football, and smothered responses. Week 1 doesn’t crown anything. It does reveal habits. And on opening day, Jacksonville’s habits — hit the crease, win the trenches, take the ball away — traveled just fine.
