The Carolina Panthers somehow figured out a way to be more offensively inept than they were last week, a game in which their quarterback tossed two pick-sixes to the same player. So, head coach Frank Reich was pretty, well, frank about it.

“Tough loss,” he said to reporters following his team’s 16-13 defeat to the Chicago Bears. “Credit to the Bears. Hard-fought game—we knew it would be. Defense continues to play great football, special teams played great, offensively—we were poor. Today was not a question of beating ourselves. We just didn’t execute as well as we needed to execute to win a football game.”

Since handing off play-calling duties to coordinator Thomas Brown, Reich’s Panthers have scored just two offensive touchdowns over three games—none of which were scored on Thursday night. Carolina amassed all of 213 yards, averaged 3.7 yards per play and converted on three of their 15 third-down tries.

Reich was then asked why there doesn’t appear to be any progress for the group.

“All I would say is, we’re not scoring points on offense. We gotta be better,” he replied. “I believe we will be better. Yeah, I mean, that’s how I feel.

I don’t think we have any unrealistic expectations. It’s not like we’re sayin’ . . . we’ve talked about this before—scoring’s down, we just gotta figure out to play well enough to win football games. That’s really what I’m concerned about is winning. I’m not worried about how many yards or what the stats are. I’m concerned about playing winning football. And I don’t wanna get caught up in the stats. I wanna get caught up in winning.”

Unfortunately, there aren’t many yards, stats or wins for this team to get caught up in right now.

Panthers’ Bozeman after loss to Bears: ‘We just weren’t executing all across the board’

Carolina Panthers quarterback Bryce Young took nine hits and was sacked three times during Thursday night’s 16-13 loss to the Chicago Bears.

“Obviously the protection has to be better,” head coach Frank Reich said after the game. “I think there are multiple things that go into that. We’re always evaluating all those.”

Young was sacked twice on third-down plays, of which the Panthers converted only 3 of 15 on the night. A third of Carolina’s drives ended in negative yardage, and potential offensive sparks stalled behind a stagnant running game

When you’ve got a rookie quarterback, defenses are going to throw something at you that you haven’t seen and they’re gonna try to pressure and create movements,” guard Austin Corbett said. “We gotta take ownership of that up front.”

The Panthers accumulated only 43 rushing yards, with few holes showing enough green for any Panthers backs to break through.

“We just weren’t executing all across the board,” center Bradley Bozeman said. “The entire offense, we’ve got to do better, we’ve got to play better.”

Bright spots on offense were few and far between, with all of Carolina’s 13 points arriving off special teams efforts thanks to returner Ihmir Smith-Marsette’s touchdown and kicker Eddie Piñeiro’s two field goals.

As for the offensive line, it’s about continuing to execute in practice and finding ways to make sure that execution ends up on the playing field.

“You’ve got to be able to look yourself in the mirror, translate it, take those practice reps and visualize them more than just in practice. Take them to meetings, take them home with you, dream about them, and make them come to life on (game days),” Corbett said.

“Whoever’s in there, we truly believe in our offensive line room and that’s what we need. We’re the five to get the job done.”