The carries varied week-to-week with Williams and Stewart. By Week 4 of Stewart's rookie year, they reached a 15-15 split on rushing attempts within the same game, but in Weeks 8 and 10, it was 17-8 and 19-7 for Williams. The important part is that all three were wins.
The high point of the pairing that year was a Week 14 game at home against the Buccaneers, when Williams had 19 carries for 186 yards and two touchdowns, and Stewart came in with 15 carries for 115 yards and two touchdowns. As you might imagine, that was also a win.
Stewart compared it to the 2022 game in which the Panthers ran for a franchise-record 320 yards against the Lions on a sub-freezing day at Bank of America Stadium. D'Onta Foreman had 21 carries for 165 yards and a touchdown, and Hubbard had 12 carries for 125 yards.
"I mean, I look back to the Tampa Bay game from my rookie year, that was the definition of we're all going to eat, and I look back to a couple of years ago, right, where Chuba and D'Onta Foreman. They played the Detroit Lions. The game plan was it's cold outside and we're all going to eat, man, grown man football. The offensive linemen, guess what they love to do? They like to eat too, so I think, give them an opportunity to take that type of form and find that type of flow because that will benefit the team mostly, especially against teams that are contenders.
"You want to be able to slow them down as much as possible, and you do that the best when you have a run game, especially with a high-power offense that's putting up big numbers that you know they have the capability of running the score up if you allow that. How do you take the ball out of their hands? That's with a successful running game."