Panthers running back Chuba Hubbard has played his entire four-year career in Carolina, and he has yet to play on a winning team. As he heads into Year Five, he’s eager to change that.
Hubbard told Scott Fowler of the _Charlotte Observer_ that the Panthers have assembled a team that can realistically think about a championship.
“If the goal isn’t to make the playoffs and [win a Super Bowl](www.charlotteobserver.com/sports/nfl/carolina-panthers/article308149325.html),” Hubbard said, “you’re selling yourself short. So that’s always been the goal. That’s the goal this year. And I think we’re the closest we’ve ever been.”
Hubbard said players like him who have been around during some tough seasons know it’s past time to turn things around.
“I think guys are finally sick of being the same ol’, same ol’ Carolina Panthers,” he said. “I think we want to get back to what they did here in the past, in 2015 \[when the Panthers went to the Super Bowl\] and some of those other years when they had deep playoff runs and had the crowd involved and the city hyped up. We haven’t had that.”
They’re long shots this year, but after an ugly start to last season, the Panthers turned things around down the stretch, going a respectable 4-5 in their last nine games and playing well in some of their losses, including going down to the wire against both of last year’s Super Bowl teams, the Chiefs and Eagles. Hubbard thinks that for the first time, he’s on a team that might be close to something special.