GRAHAM GANO has never been one to shirk a heavy workload.
But he'll be hoping his Carolina teammates won't be as singularly reliant on him tonight as they were the last time they faced down the Seattle Seahawks.
The Scottish-born kicker accounted for all of the Panthers' points in October's 13-9 defeat to the reigning Super Bowl champions, on an afternoon when little went right for the underdogs. The Panthers are again far from favoured to overturn the Seahawks in tonight's renewal.
But with a place in the NFC Championship game - one step away from the Super Bowl - on the line in Seattle and with Carolina riding the crest of a four-game winning streak that has made them the surprise package of the last eight of the NFL season, confidence and momentum are sky high. An upset - albeit a massive one - is no longer as unlikely as it may have seemed a few short weeks ago.
"There's always a chance," head coach Ron Rivera told US media yesterday. "I always say this: There's a reason why you play the games. Remember that line from (the film) 'Little Giants?' The little kids are talking and one says, He may have beaten me 99 times, but that 100th time, I got him.
"I can see it in my team. They know. They're playing with house money. Nobody expected them to be here. They were loose last week, and they're loose this week."
In a match-up featuring two defences who have turned significant corners in recent times, the margins could be fine. If Carolina can manage to contain the Seahawks all-action quarterback-running back combination of Russell Wilson and Marshawn Lynch - the latter's play-off touchdowns in both 2011 and 2014 have triggered seismic activity in the Seattle region - then the onus may well fall on Gano again.
"I've got all the confidence in the world in him," Rivera said recently of his Arbroath-born kicker. "He's going to get an opportunity to win a big one for us, whether it's this week or some other time. The key for him is just being focused and ready. I'd like to believe when he gets an opportunity to win a big one for us, he'll put it right down the middle."
Elsewhere tonight Tom Brady and the New England Patriots will host the 2013 champions Baltimore in Boston. The two most successful play-off teams of the past 15 years are all-too familiar foes at the business end of the season.
The home side won 12 of their 16 regular-season games and are heavily favoured to progress to another AFC Championship game. "We've put ourselves in a good position," said Brady, whose 18 playoff wins are the most in league history. "We've just got to take advantage of it."
The resurgent Dallas Cowboys will travel to Green Bay for a repeat of the legendary Ice Bowl of 1966 when the Packer triumphed as temperatures plunged to -43 degrees Celsius. By comparison tomorrow's forecast is for a balmy -10C. The weekend is rounded off with the legendary Peyton Manning facing his former team when the Indianapolis Colts face the Broncos in Denver.
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