Big Plays: Smith continues to make them

Steve Smith was held to four catches last week as the Carolina Panthers beat the Green Bay Packers 35-31 at Lambeau Field.

But Smith came up with the biggest catch of the game, a spectacular 54-yard reception while falling down with 1:33 remaining that moved the Panthers into point-blank range and set up DeAngelo Williams' game-winning touchdown run on the next play.

As the Panthers head into the stretch run starting with their showdown against Tampa Bay on Monday night, both are noteworthy.

Teams continue to look for ways to shut Smith down, as the Packers were relatively successful in doing last week.

And yet, Smith continues to find ways to make big plays at crucial times and is always a threat to have a big game.

How this dynamic continues to play out should help determine whether the Panthers win the NFC South and go deep into the playoffs, or falter down the stretch.

"Teams play us different because of Steve, they really do," quarterback Jake Delhomme said during the week. "That's the element he brings. He's a very good player and even when he doesn't get the ball he can affect a football game."

The Bucs don't even bother denying that Smith is the one player they attempt to stop when preparing for the Panthers.

"As you know, if you take him out of the football game, they are a different football team," cornerback Ronde Barber said during a teleconference with Charlotte-area media. "Playing these guys twice a year, we understand that challenge. You have to respect what he can do to you.

"Obviously, they have other playmakers.… You understand that they are going to get their plays. But you know you can't give up those explosion plays to Steve Smith, and you try to make them beat you in other ways."

Smith will go into Monday night's game with 52 catches for 958 yards and four touchdowns in 10 games. That puts him at sixth in the NFL rankings in reception yardage and 29th in the league in receptions.

He has had his best three-week stretch of the season in the past three weeks, combining for 18 catches worth 346 yards. He had six catches for 63 yards against Detroit, a season-high eight catches for 168 yards against Atlanta, and then four catches for 105 yards last week.

The best stretch before that was against Tampa Bay, New Orleans and Arizona earlier in the season, when he caught 17 passes.

None of that compares to his 2005 season, when he led the NFL in receptions (103), reception yards (1,563) and touchdown receptions (12). But that was the year that cemented once and for all that opponents would gear all their coverages to stopping him.

Smith traces it to the NFC Championship game at Seattle, when he had five catches for 33 yards, with none for more than 12 yards. That was the week after he had caught 12 for 218 yards and two touchdowns in a playoff win at Chicago. He had caught 10 the previous week in a first-round win against the New York Giants.

"My life pretty much changed as far as me running man-to-man routes after the Seattle game," Smith said. "Pretty much after that, I learned that things are going to be different, and they have been since then."

But he has come to accept that he's not going to run free most of the time, and that the Panthers' other receivers must step up.

"I just keep running my routes," Smith said. "If I have three guys lined up against me and we can't get the ball downfield, I wouldn't say that is the quarterback or the offensive line or the wide receiver. I would say that is on the people that have to make adjustments. If you tell me to run a slant route and I have three guys on me, you can't get mad at me if I run exactly what you called. And you can't get mad at the quarterback if he can't throw that route to me and has to go somewhere else. "

He can, though, pick and choose his spots -- as he did last week at Green Bay.

"I say it every year that we play the Panthers, that guy is a nightmare," Coach Jon Gruden of the Bucs said. "He's like Freddy Krueger. He scares the hell out of me. Every film I pick up, he's brilliant. He makes some of the darnedest catches. He's a great competitor. He just scares me. I don't like to see Steve."

■ John Delong can be reached at jdelong@wsjournal.com.