The Carolina Panthers have been one of the league’s most infuriating teams, with wins against the Rams and Packers, and losses against the Cardinals and Saints.
Let’s take a closer look at the Panthers’ chances of making the NFL Playoffs under Dave Canales in 2025, and what needs to happen for them to make the cut.
What Are the Carolina Panthers’ Chances of Making the Playoffs and Winning the NFC South?
The Panthers secured a massive win in Week 16 over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, putting them in an ideal spot to make the playoffs.
According to PFSN’s NFL Playoff Predictor, the Panthers now have a 60.80% chance of winning the NFC South and making the playoffs. If the postseason started today, Carolina would have faced the Los Angeles Rams in the Wild Card round.
There’s good news for the Panthers, but they still have a game left against the Buccaneers. As a result, they cannot take their foot off the gas and must continue to work hard.
PAID THE RANSOM
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— Carolina Panthers (@Panthers) December 21, 2025
The Panthers can only make the NFL Playoffs by winning their division, as they don’t have a strong enough record to contend for a Wild Card slot. But there’s only one team that matters in their hunt for the division, and that’s the Buccaneers.
Outside of their Week 18 game against the Panthers, the Buccaneers also play the Miami Dolphins at home. The Dolphins have benched Tua Tagovailoa for Quinn Ewers, so the Buccaneers should have a decent chance at winning that game.
The Panthers, meanwhile, face a Seattle Seahawks team that just beat the projected 1-seed Rams, making a win less likely for Carolina in their final non-divisional game.
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There are three most likely outcomes in the upcoming Panthers vs. Buccaneers series to decide the NFC South. Either Carolina sweeps, or they split. And in the event that an unlikely tie occurs, whoever wins the other game wins the division.
The Buccaneers have a 50.5% chance of beating Miami, while Carolina only has a 30.2% chance of beating Seattle. If those percentages hold, or even if both teams lose their non-divisional matchups, Carolina is still at risk of losing the division in an 8-9 or 9-8 tiebreaker scenario by splitting with the Buccaneers.
A split would bring both teams past the head-to-head tiebreaker and would also leave both teams with the exact same in-division record. The next tiebreaker is record among common opponents. Right now, Tampa Bay leads Carolina with a 6-5 common opponents record, as opposed to Carolina’s 5-6.
Before Week 16, more outcomes involved Tampa Bay winning the division, and the team had control over its own destiny if it could win two of its remaining three games. Now, they need to win both of their remaining games and hope for the Panthers to lose to the Seahawks.
Regardless, the Panthers are still in the race, and if there’s anything Canales and Bryce Young have taught us in 2025, it’s that just when we start to rule them out, they break back into the discussion.
Panthers’ Remaining 2025 Schedule
Carolina’s remaining schedule features two head-to-head matchups against its prime competitions in the conference:
- Week 17: vs. Seattle Seahawks
- Week 18: at Tampa Bay Buccaneers
The Panthers don’t have a win projection over 46.6% for any of their remaining games, but Canales’ Carolina squad has been one of the more difficult teams to predict outcomes for over the course of the 2025 regular season.
The Panthers have experienced both disappointing losses and shocking triumphs. There’s no denying that the team has taken, at the very least, a small step forward in Canales’ second year, but one misstep in the final three weeks could snuff out their NFC South title and NFL Playoff hopes.
