Sorry for the late answer. I think they have played decent home games this year beating a solid playoff Team in Cincinnati and a mediocre Chargers team. Carolina played phenomenal recently and won 6 games in a row, but with wins over SF and NE, I think this could be a letdown spot tonight for a hard season final. But I totaly agree with you that there are not many valid arguments against the Panthers tonight, but it's the NFL and sometimes there occur strange things.
The prediction with the field goal was more kind of a gut feeling, but I like homedogs in the NFL.