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CHARLOTTE -- The pace quickened Friday evening as the Carolina Panthers and their fans made last-minute adjustments for tonight's epochal event.

Things like mud cleats and rain coats and umbrellas and extra towels were being stacked in corners as the team and 74,000 fans checked off the final items on the long list of things to do before kickoff.

For the Panthers, who will play host to the third home NFL playoff game in their history tonight at 8:15 at Bank of America Stadium, that meant final walk-throughs and film sessions, final messages from the coaching staff and support personnel. And across the city, the items flew from the shelves. Playoff paraphernalia is a cottage industry in the NFL, and few franchises or cities handle it better than the one hosting an NFC divisional playoff game tonight.

When the Panthers make the playoffs, they tend to make a push deep into the tournament. A win tonight would put Carolina in a fourth NFC title game since joining the league in 1995, and scattered throughout the stadium will be reminders of those years as old playoff paraphernalia tends to last awhile.

That was not the case last week in Arizona.

The NFC West champion Cardinals played the franchise's first home playoff game since 1947 and won their second postseason game in the history of the organization, one that goes back through St. Louis all the way to Chicago. Kurt Warner was asked about that history this week, and he didn't shy away from the questions.

"I don't think it affects you a lot," said the Cardinals' quarterback. "It affects you more in regards to how long you've been part of the history. I don't think anyone can really associate with the first home playoff game in 50 years or the first since such and such. But what I can relate to personally is that I've been here four years and haven't been in the playoffs since I've been here. I can definitely associate with that part of the history."

What was on the minds of the Panthers this week as they made adjustments to an October game plan was that game in October, when Carolina came back to beat Arizona 27-23 the week before the bye. Some have been saying all week that it was that game that turned the season for the Panthers. But those people have no sense of history.

The weeks after the bye almost destroyed the Panthers -- terrible performances against Oakland, Detroit and Atlanta that left those same clueless people questioning the merits of what was then an 8-3 football team. History will show they were going through one of those seismic shifts teams rarely survive in midseason. The decision was being made to all but drop the two-man running attack and go with DeAngelo Williams exclusively.

You won't hear them say that this week or any week, and around the league people are enamored with the twosome. The fact is, though, Williams has rushed for 1,097 yards since Week 7. Jonathan Stewart has rushed for 364, and 130 of those yards came in the Detroit game.

If the Panthers make their customary run in the playoffs, this will be one of those little bits of lore that might never be told. It doesn't fit the storyline, and it has an affect on jersey sales, too.

Carolina will have largely the same game plan today it used in October, running the ball with Williams and looking for Steve Smith deep downfield. That's a subtle change the team made in midseason when it was still trying to establish Stewart, still trying to overcome a string of injuries along the offensive front and still trying to mask its porous secondary.

Legend will show that Carolina took care of all those things. Or it will show that one of them proved to be the Panthers' downfall. Almost no one expects Carolina to lose this game, which was why the pace had quickened late Friday with the team making its last adjustments and fans making plans for a deeper run into the playoffs than just tonight.

Quarterback Jake Delhomme said this week he hasn't even looked one play ahead as the Panthers made a bumpy season seem seamless, winning three out of four games in each of the quarters Fox designates as the season's plotline. Carolina comes into this game healthy, deep, talented and with the advantage of home field and a playoff history. For a team that didn't exist 15 years ago going up against a franchise founded in 1898 and in the NFL since its inception in 1922, that's saying something.

Warner wasn't around then, and he wanted to make that clear this week. He had nothing to do with the 50 years of futility that followed 1947. The Panthers wanted to make sure they weren't looking back tonight when the ball is kicked and Carolina enters another round of playoffs for a fan base that can remember every playoff game in franchise history.

They were already getting ready Friday night as the lights came on at Bank of America Stadium and the coaches made last-second checks and the support people made last-second changes and the fans made last-second decisions in the final hours before becoming a part of something no one should ever take for granted -- the fleeting nature of pro football history.

Contact Ed Hardin at 373-7069 or ed.hardin@news-record.com