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- All-Pro receiver Puka Nacua scored two first-half touchdowns and sealed a Rams’ playoff victory with a crucial fourth-quarter pass breakup against Carolina.
- Matthew Stafford engineered the comeback with the winning touchdown pass, playing through a finger injury on his throwing hand.
- Nacua proved once again why he should be the NFL offensive player of the year.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — At Bank of America Stadium on Saturday, Puka Nacua was pure money.
Not only did he score back-to-back touchdowns in the first half, but the All-Pro Rams receiver saved the game in the fourth quarter by denying Carolina an interception.
Puka became PBU-ka.
That’s shorthand for Pass Breakup, and Nacua executed that beautifully on a soft, high pass from Matthew Stafford that sailed over Nacua’s head and into the hands of leaping Panthers safety Nick Scott, who was falling back into the end zone.
Nacua suddenly became a defender and jarred the ball loose before Scott could secure it.
Matthew Stafford connects on a 19-yard touchdown pass to Colby Parkinson late in the fourth quarter to seal a 34-31 wild-card playoff win over Carolina.
“I thought [Nacua] was going to go up there and kind of post up, and I was like, ‘OK, let’s see what you got,’” Stafford said. “I threw it and as soon as I cut it loose, he kind of turned away and it was just tough timing. But what a play to go fight through it and get that thing knocked out.”
It was a moment that should be memorialized on Nacua’s robust career highlight reel, and helped him atone for a rare dropped would-be touchdown at the end of the first half.
Nacua should be the NFL’s offensive player of the year, and the Rams aren’t going to make a playoff run unless he turns in big game after big game.
“He’s a freaking warrior,” coach Sean McVay said.
The Rams found out something about themselves in the 34-31 victory, a near-disaster for a team favored by 10½ points. They finally found a way to win a game when dangled over a cliff. Each of their losses this season was by a touchdown or less, and each time they failed to come through down the stretch — Philadelphia, San Francisco, Carolina, Seattle and Atlanta.
Finally, they answered the call.
Nacua was an essential component to that, reeling in a game-high 10 passes for 111 yards. On a play in the fourth quarter, he made a catch in the middle of three converging defenders — Stafford fit the football through a mail slot — and the trio of Panthers crashed into one another Keystone Kops-style. That play knocked star cornerback Jaycee Horn out of the game.
But it was that pass breakup that will live in the memory of Nacua’s defensive teammates.
“I’ve got to get his skeletal structure because I think he’s, like, big boned,” Rams safety Quentin Lake said. “He’s a big dude. But at the same time, he’s just amazing.”
A big LeBron James fan, Nacua watches highlights of the Lakers’ star before he takes the football field. Before Saturday’s game, he and Lake had a “King James” debate.
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Gary Klein breaks down what went right for the Rams in their 34-31 wild-card playoff victory over the Carolina Panthers.
“He said, ‘What do you think his best year was?’” Lake said. “I said 2018, and he said it was 2012, that Miami year [when James] was most valuable player of the NBA and Finals, and led Team USA to an Olympic gold medal]. He said he was going to be that tonight, and that’s what he did.”
Happy as he was about the win, Nacua was still reliving what might have been at the end of the first half, when he had beat his defender and a spot-on pass from Stafford sailed through his hands. That could have been a touchdown.
“Those are opportunities, man, you can’t miss out on,” Nacua said. “A chance to score before half and then double up because we know we’re getting the ball [at the start of the third quarter]. That’s what coach talks about. You never want to let No. 9 down.”
Stafford, who wears No. 9, came through down the stretch after a cold spell when he had seven consecutive incomplete passes — his longest such streak with the Rams — and had surgical precision with his winning, 19-yard touchdown pass to Colby Parkinson. All that, and the quarterback was dealing with an injured finger on his throwing hand.
As for Nacua’s hands, he babies them. He typically gets a manicure before games, and wears clear polish on his nails. Those hands are his money-makers. He didn’t see the beautician in the week leading up to this game, however, because his mom was in town and therefore he didn’t have the time.
“I’ll be back in there this week,” he said.
On a day where Rams fans everywhere were chewing off their own nails, Nacua’s hands held up just fine.
The Rams’ uneasy playoff win over Carolina raises questions about their Super Bowl readiness, but no one should question Matthew Stafford’s importance.
