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Carolina Panthers

Panthers break schedule up at bye, excited for 'second season'

Nov 1, 2011

Cam Newton sat at his locker alone for several minutes following Sunday's last second loss to the Vikings. It's become the norm for a quarterback who is earning glowing reviews around the league, but can't seem to get his team the win

"You look at our record, it says a lot," Newton said. "Actions speak much louder than words."

The rookie may feel that way, but the coaches and veteran players seem to be looking at the big picture.

The Panthers, who are off this week, sit at 2-6 at the half way point of the season. Five of those six losses were decided by a touchdown or less. There is a visible and drastic improvement from last year's team.

 "I think expectations were not that high," head coach Ron River said. "Now they are high and they should be."

Linebacker Dan Conner looks at the break in the middle of the schedule as a way of separating the year into two seasons.

"The good thing about a bye right now is we have a whole other season where we can right the ship," he said.

Newton, who has a Rookie of the Year resume so far, is leading the way for this young team and Rivera said he is ahead of schedule in his development

"We are very fortunate this process has been accelerated," Rivera said. "I think we thought this would be a little more of a work-in-progress, but it isn't."

Rivera added that if the rest of the team can catch up, the second half of the season will look very different than the first half.

• Reporter: Mandy Mitchell
• Web Editor: Aaron Schoonmaker