Panthers Are Super

Fifteen minutes in, the party had already started: the laughing, the singing, the Dabbing, the crowing. The U2 song “Sunday Bloody Sunday” rang through the loudspeakers, and towels waved, and it continued to feel, justifiably, as if the Carolina Panthers were on the verge of another score.

Well, when were they not? Fifteen minutes in, the Panthers had 17 points and were racing like foxhounds after the scent of a Super Bowl, dusting theArizona Cardinals in this matchup between top seeds in the N.F.C. championship game, a matchup that was rapidly tilting toward one side.

With the best record in football, with the probable NFL most valuable player at quarterback and a league-high 10 players selected to the Pro Bowl, Carolina still felt disrespected in this season of so much parity and mediocrity across the rest of the league. The Panthers’ response Sunday was simply to hammer Arizona, 49-15.

With the win, Carolina (17-1) advanced to the Super Bowl for the second time in franchise history. Instead of a rematch with New England on Feb. 7, the Panthers will face the Denver Broncos, who defeated the Patriots earlier Sunday, 20-18, in the A.F.C. championship game.

At Bank of America Stadium, it was the first postseason matchup between Heisman Trophy-winning quarterbacks, although comparing those quarterbacks — the Panthers’ Cam Newton and the Cardinals’ Carson Palmer — was a bit like saying snowmobiles and snowplows were both winter vehicles. Yes, but.

Newton, 26, tall and limber, offers a fearsome combination of strength and speed.

His on-field antics can be grating — after touchdowns this season (and there were many), he would shimmy and shake with a perfect Cheshire cat grin that seemed just a tad too bright, too confident, too playful. He brought a little-known dance move, the Dab, in which a person pretends to sneeze into his elbow, into the mainstream. He was easy to love, or to loathe.

But Newton had reason to beam. No quarterback in N.F.L. history had thrown for more than 30 scores and rushed for more than 10 in a single season before he did so this season. Throughout the week, he looked casual and unburdened.

Palmer, on the other hand, knows how unforgiving the N.F.L. can be.

A decade older than Newton, and in his 13th season, Palmer, who has twice sustained serious knee injuries, set Arizona’s franchise record for passing yards (4,671), touchdowns (35) and passer rating (104.6) this season. That was followed by a win in the divisional round over Green Bay, Palmer’s first postseason victory.

After that game, Palmer admitted to some nerves. He had struggled. A dislocated finger on his throwing hand, injured in Week 15, might have bothered him. Perhaps it was the Packers’ pressuring defense, which swarmed him constantly.

Regardless, Palmer persevered, throwing the winning touchdown pass in overtime to send the Cardinals to the conference title game.

But the struggles returned Sunday. The Panthers’ defense appeared impossibly fast, making Palmer look slow and bumbling. With Carolina leading by 24-7 late in the first half, defensive end Charles Johnson poked the ball out of Palmer’s hand, and the Panthers recovered at the Cardinals’ 31-yard line. After Newton threw an interception near the goal line, which was returned 72 yards by Patrick Peterson to Carolina’s 22, Palmer had an opportunity for redemption. But he floated his first pass, and it was intercepted by safety Kurt Coleman.

Palmer finished 23 of 40 for 235 yards, with one touchdown, four interceptions and two fumbles lost to Carolina’s defense, which forced seven turnovers altogether.

“This is as low as you can feel,” Palmer said. “To leave the way we’re leaving, it just hurts.”

The Panthers led the N.F.L. with 39 takeaways this season, and members of the secondary called their row of lockers “Thieves Avenue.”

“We take footballs from quarterbacks,” safety Tre Boston said.

That seemed to be an understatement on Sunday.

“Our guys flew around; they hustled,” Panthers Coach Ron Rivera said.

Arizona (14-4) practiced at home in the desert all week, unconcerned with the conditions in North Carolina, where snow and freezing rain buffeted the region on Friday. The Cardinals came prepared for a sloppy field, however, practicing with seven-studded cleats specifically designed for soggy turf.

The field held up well despite the snowdrifts ringing its perimeter, and the weather at kickoff was calm and clear. There were no excuses for Arizona.

“We just didn’t have it today,” said Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald, who was held to four catches for 30 yards. “It really stings.”

On offense, the Panthers, who leapt out to a 31-0 lead over Seattle a week earlier, were looking explosive again Sunday. Newton completed six of his first seven passes, and he flipped the ball to Ted Ginn Jr., who scored on a 22-yard end-around. Ginn, who was cut by Arizona last February after one season, zigzagged all the way to the right, outrunning the Cardinals’ defense to the end zone with 4 minutes 31 seconds left in the first quarter.

On the Panthers’ next possession, Newton, backed up into his own territory, wove a pass over the middle to Corey Brown, who broke a tackle by safety Rashad Johnson and raced free, going 86 yards for a 17-0 first-quarter lead.

After a strip sack by Carolina defensive tackle Kawann Short on Arizona’s first possession of the second quarter, the stadium began to shake, as if about to lift off.

“We knew if we get off the ball, we can be unstoppable,” Short said.

When Newton, who finished 19 of 28 for 335 yards with two touchdowns and one interception, leapt over the pile to score from 1 yard out late in the first half, bringing Carolina’s lead to 24-7, the party raged on. Newton also had a 12-yard run for a touchdown in the third quarter and finished with 47 yards on 10 rushing attempts.

And when a pass tipped off Peterson’s fingertips and landed in Ginn’s hands for a long completion late in the third quarter, the sense grew stronger still: This was Carolina’s night and, quite possibly, Carolina’s year.