Brian Burns admitted frustration led to ejection

And with that result, the Panthers are officially eliminated from playoff contention, but Tabor said he was encouraged by the way they responded.

“I love those guys,” Tabor said. “I do, and I’ll jump in a foxhole with those guys any day of the week. I feel for them. I mean, losing stinks, and it’s hard, and it’s frustrating.

“But at the same time, you, you know, you can handle things two ways, and that’s what we talked about. You can either handle it with character or you can handle it with compromise. So, which one is it going to be? And I like our guys. So we’ll just keep working.”

The response in the locker room was muted as you might imagine, as a long season gone wrong weighs heavily on their minds. None more so Sunday than Burns, who wasn’t around for the end of it.

“I’m proud of the team, you know,” he said quietly. “I’m proud of how we fought. We didn’t give up, and fought to the end of the close game.

“I just wish I didn’t make that mistake, so I could have been out there with them.”