Lions lose to Panthers: What Dan Campbell said about defensive woes in 32-26 defeat
Postgame: Dan Campbell after Lions loss to Panthers
Lions coach Dan Campbell faces the media after Sunday night's loss in Carolina.
FOX 2 - Sunday night's 32-26 loss by the Lions against the Carolina Panthers laid bare everything fans had worried about with Detroit's defense for months.
The backstory:
The Super Bowl contending Bills shredding the Detroit defense in Week 2 was one thing, but many were taken aback by the Panthers looking just as explosive, despite missing two injured starting receivers.
Lions coach Dan Campbell said he is standing by defensive coordinator Kelvin Sheppard, saying he isn't going to talk about a change.
"I'm not talking about all that," he said. "I'm talking about getting better right now with what we've got, and that's what we're going to do. We're going to find a way to get better with what we have."
The Lions rank last in points allowed at over 31 points per game, last in passing yards allowed and last in total yards allowed.
Against the run, Detroit is 20th against the run, mainly because teams are opting to attack through the air.
Campbell: Lack of Turnovers costly
Dig deeper:
"We got no takeaways. We have to get takeaways," he said. "We just have to, and we got nothing. And so, not good enough."
The Lions defense are tied for 11th in defensive turnovers, but have no interceptions through four games.
Campbell was asked whether the team had the pieces in the secondary (which entered the season with safeties Kerby Joseph and Brian Branch injured).
"I'm not even going to worry about all that. My job is to get these guys going, man," he said. "And we've got guys on the back end that can cover. We got guys that can hit. We got to pull this thing together and find the right combination of coverage versus pressure and job responsibility, putting guys in the right spot to do what they do."
Last week standout cornerback Joey Porter Jr. was traded from the Steelers to the Cowboys — with many fans irate that the Lions would bypass a chance to address the biggest defensive need.
Campbell claimed the Lions were "very much in" on the Porter trade talks.
Sunday night, Panthers receiver Tetairoa McMillan had a career-high 147 yards in the first half along, en route to a 14-catch, 192 yards and two touchdowns.
In the second half, Panther running back Chuba Hubbard did most of his damage, on his way to 122 yards.
"We really start the game, you know, we didn't We didn't do well enough in the coverage aspect," Campbell said. "In the second half, the issue was then the run got us, you know. And we started bleeding yards there in the second half, and that's the one thing we couldn't let happen."
Lions Rally Falls Short
Campbell was pleased with how the Lions fought back, but mentioned a lack of efficiency on offense.
The Lions got 400-plus yards from Jared Goff in a furious rally late, but settled for field goals early and had to abandon the run.
Campbell was asked if the Lions can simply rely on just trying to win shootouts this season. He said his focus going into the game was discipline and effort.
"It's just not good enough and we got to score more points," he said. "We've got to be more efficient than we've been. We got off to a slow start. We had two opportunities there at the end, and we didn't get it done.
"So we've got be better there and we gotta get takeaways on defense. That's going to have to be our recipe."
What's next:
The Lions stay on the road, playing at the Arizona Cardinals at 4:25 p.m. Sunday.
The Source: Information from the Lions postgame press conference was used in this story as well as a previous published report regarding the Joey Porter situation.