CHARLOTTE — On the bus ride to the Georgia Dome that day, Tre Boston leaned over to Roman Harper and told him about a dream he had the night before in the team hotel.

They were both going to get interceptions off Matt Ryan that day.

"Which is crazy because we both got pick-sixes," Boston said with a laugh at that particular prophecy.

It was an oddly specific dream, and the fact that it came true was so fitting for the 2014 Panthers.

The last Panthers team to face a win-and-in situation like the current team faces this weekend in Tampa, that one did it with a bunch of kids, and went about it messily, and were fortunate that an entire division did the same. Nothing was ever easy, and even when it ended, critics abounded because the numbers didn't look like a playoff team.

Sound familiar?

But the numbers didn't matter when the dream came true, and they won that final game they needed to win to cap the most improbable playoff run in the unlikeliest of ways.

But through it all, there was a clear-eyed confidence that it was going to happen.

If there were doubters, none of them were in that Panthers locker room.

"I remember going into that last game, is us understanding we're in our flow, we are who we are, and we've got one team in front of us," Boston said, warming up like a preacher feeling the Holy Ghost as the sermon begins. "And when we go down there, we are going to get the job done, we're going to play well, we're going to kick their ass. It was such a belief in us and what we had been doing. That there was no ifs or buts about it. It's like we are going down there to do this, and that's absolutely what we did.

"Going into that week, there was a true belief, and I will hound on belief as long as you'll ever hear about me because I understand the magnitude of when people come together, find their rhythm, and they believe in who they are as a team, they can get the job done."

That team did, and a dream came true.

But as they all remember it, there was nothing easy about it.

Before you get to that last one — which might have been one of the easiest ones of the bunch — you had to go back to the hardest, and how coach Ron Rivera reacted to it.

On Nov. 30, 2014, the Panthers came out of a bye week and went to Minnesota, where the Vikings were playing outdoors while a new stadium was under construction. It was all of 12 degrees at kickoff, minus-7 with the wind chill. And when the game started, it only got worse.

The Vikings blocked two punts and returned them for touchdowns (one by future Panthers receiver Adam Thielen) and gave them a 31-13 thrashing.

"Just a disaster of a game," said long snapper JJ Jansen, the last remaining member of that team on the current roster. "We were really bad on special teams in particular, two blocked punts for touchdowns, it was a really, really cold day. We lost 31-13, and I don't even know that the score was that close.

"And Ron came into the locker room after the game. We were 3-8-1. And he goes, basically, there's still hope we can still win this division, and I think everyone in the locker room kind of thought Ron's crazy. Like, you just watch what happened, right? We hadn't won in October or November, but he just had such confidence in our group, and he continued to sell hope to the guys."

Veteran linebacker Thomas Davis, one of the spiritual leaders of that team, remembered a sharper tone out of Rivera, even if the message was the same.

"He lit into us after that game," Davis recalled. "Because, really, the special teams, like we all had our hand in some s--- that game, because defensively there were times where we played like s---, offensively and then special teams that game like you gave up two blocked punts

"So just looking at that and making a determination as a leadership group that it was time to change the way that we looked at things and the way that we approached the game. And collectively, I think everybody bought in. We didn't have any pushback."

But Rivera was definitely willing to push them, and continue selling that hope, for a few reasons.

One was the fact that the Saints were still just 5-7 after beating the Steelers that day, and the Falcons would get to 5-7 by beating the Cardinals later that afternoon. So they could see what was in front of them, even if the path to getting there wasn't as visible.

But Rivera also watched much of this same team go 12-4 and win the division the year before.

"The year before was not a mistake. It wasn't by accident, right?" Rivera said this week. "I think a lot of it had to do with the realization that we are better than that, we are a better team."

Of course, that team was different in a lot of ways and went through some painful transitions.

Bedrock left tackle Jordan Gross retired in February. Then-general manager Dave Gettleman released wide receiver Steve Smith in March, clearing the way for quarterback Cam Newton to take control of the locker room. In May, star pass-rusher Greg Hardy, who they had franchise-tagged after a 15-sack season, was arrested for assault and communicating threats following a domestic incident. While the legal process was playing out, he appeared in the opener, but was then placed on the commissioner's exempt list and would never play another game for the team (despite pulling a full salary for the year).

So there was a lot going on, and that 3-8-1 start came from a lot of places.

Rivera had tried filling in with a lot of veteran players, like cornerback Antoine Cason and safety Thomas Decoud. But at a certain point, it became obvious some things were going to have to change.

So over the last month of the season, they parked some old guys and started turning to younger players like cornerback Josh Norman and rookie defensive backs like Tre Boston and Bene Benwikere, among others.

"Those were guys that really came in and helped change the trajectory of the way things were going," Davis said. "And offensively we started making some plays, and we got that running game going and we just literally started to gel as a football team at the right time."

Still, it took more than a few subs. It took playing some actual football.

The week after the Minnesota debacle, the Panthers went to New Orleans, which, fortunately for the Panthers, was the site of a similar set of struggles.

"The division did us a favor that year," Davis said flatly. "Like, everybody sucked in the division that year. The Falcons, the Saints, all of us, everybody sucked."

But no matter how bad the division, the winner got a playoff berth, so they had something to play for.

So of course, they blew the Saints doors off the same way the Vikings had to them a week earlier.

Jonathan Stewart ran for 155 yards that day, including a 69-yard touchdown, and the Panthers rolled to a 41-10 win. Cam Newton threw three touchdowns, ran for another one, and something began to grow.

"We went to New Orleans, and we ran the ball well that game," Stewart said. "And it was coming off of the Minnesota game, where offensively, I felt like we were, it was cold as all get out, we just didn't want to be there. Like we were on the sidelines just like, man, this ain't it.

"But we, we did certain things in that Saints game where I felt, man, we've just got to stick with it, right? Stick with who we are, our DNA, and everything else will pay off.

"Then we beat the Saints, and it's like oh, you're telling me there's a chance, right? And that's all you really need as a competitor is to know that you still have a chance, and that means you can go and right your wrongs."

Again, it wasn't going to be that easy. This is the NFC South, and this was a suddenly 4-8-1 team that was about to get another major shock.

On Tuesday, before their next game, Newton was driving to work to study film when his truck was hit by a car on the Church Street overpass, flipping twice and leaving him with two broken bones in his back. He was still smiling when the ambulance got there, but the reality was, their season now hinged on a backup.

Of course, this was no ordinary backup; it was Derek Anderson, and the Buccaneers were up next. Anderson had a bit of a journeyman career (with a 20-29 career record), but he was 6-3 lifetime against Tampa Bay, including in the opener that year that Newton missed with a rib injury.

"Derek Anderson always killed the Bucs," Jansen laughed. "That was sort of his team that he would just take out.

"And all of a sudden, you found yourself kind of with everything in front of us, we knew at that point we controlled our own destiny."

The following week, they beat the Browns to improve to 6-8-1, while the Falcons beat the Saints to leave them both at 6-9 going into the final week of the season, with the Panthers going to Atlanta, and the Saints to Tampa to close with the 2-13 Buccaneers.

"I just think that there was this feeling of we're on a roll, we're hot," Jansen said. "The division was ours for the taking, and we'd already beaten two of the division teams. And so it kind of felt like you were on this roll. And there is something nice about being the chaser in this environment, because you feel like you're the ascending team, not the team collapsing in front of everyone."

As they prepared for that finale in Atlanta, Rivera kept thinking back to a book defensive coordinator Sean McDermott had given him called, "Read This Book Tonight To Help You Win Tomorrow," that talked about that hoariest of football cliches, "any given Sunday."

And he told his 6-8-1 football team, which was the butt of jokes around the league, that they didn't have to be great; they just had to be better than the team on the other sideline on that particular day, and they were going to the playoffs.

"We've all heard that our whole life, but I got in front of the team and said, ' What does that mean?" Rivera said. "I said, that means anybody can beat anybody. All you have to be is the better team that day. So I challenged the guys to be better that day, to be better every play, to step on the field and win every play, one play at a time.

"I mean, that was basically the challenge. You don't have to be the best team. You just have to be the better team that day. And that was our mantra right on through the playoffs."

Rivera said he could tell that the team was onto something that week in practice, when the music was playing, players were dancing, and they had smiles on their faces.

"They were having fun and they were focused," Rivera said. "They were having fun, and they were focused 100 percent, because we had gained so much momentum. And we knew we were not the team people wanted to play at the end of the year.

"In late September, October, it was like drudgery. November was drudgery, but then all of a sudden we get on that roll, we won three in a row, you know, we're sitting there, and we're on the precipice of taking that next step. I think the guys all felt it, and so they came to practice, and it wasn't the drudgery of being at practice. It was the excitement of getting ready to win a game."

Rivera's message resonated, and there wasn't any guilt about being 6-8-1. Because they knew a win at Atlanta, and they were going to the playoffs.

"We were peaking at the right time," Stewart said. "When you get into December, and you're playing meaningful football, you've earned the right to have meaningful football, and it's all about peaking.

"You peak at the right time with an opportunity. That's the perfect mixture, right? If you're peaking at the right time and you don't have the opportunity, that's not fun."

And on that bus ride to the Georgia Dome, as Boston told Roman Harper about the dream he had the night before, that opportunity began to take shape.

The Panthers hit the Falcons early and often that game, with Harper getting his pick-six in the second quarter to make it 17-3, and Boston's 84-yarder at the end of the third quarter icing it at 34-3.

Davis got an interception too that day, and took it to the end zone, but it was called back for a penalty, leaving him a little salty.

"Got me for illegal contact at 5-and-a-half yards on Roddy (White)," Davis said, shaking his head.

But that combination of old heads like Davis and Harper, and a rookie like Boston doing the damage was an object lesson.

"After New Orleans, the coaches really allowed us to be us and let our young boys eat," Boston said. "Like we're, we're going to win with these guys or not. And about the time we got to the Falcons, we weren't young guys anymore. We understood that we had an opportunity to make plays, and it was our job to make plays for our team."

Boston laughs when he thinks about that dagger of a pick-six because Newton tried to convince him to give the ball to a fan in the stands, which was his post-touchdown tradition.

"Cam met me in the end zone. He was trying to get me to give my ball away, but he was tripping," Boston laughed. "That was my first pick, so I needed that one at the crib. That one's got to go to Mama's house.

"It was over then because as an NFL team, you understand when you have taken the team's will, when literally, the breath is out of the stadium. We were kind of known for doing that."

When Boston talks about it now, it's with the benefit of hindsight, with knowing how the story unfolded, and that they'd go 15-1 the following year.

But in that moment, it might have been harder to discern, but for the belief they shared, they could get that done.

"You'd be amazed how many guys that get into a fourth quarter, and they're down seven who don't believe we can win this game, who are already kind of moping," Boston said. "But it's like we believed at any point, we could win ball games. We had what it takes, and we had the right guys in our locker room.

"So the belief system came from, veterans who knew. We had veterans that you can lean on. And it just trickled down from top to bottom."

The fact that this story is so similar to what's playing out now isn't lost on the ones who are watching it. Jansen's living it, so he appreciates it.

The 8-8 Panthers are going to Tampa to play the 7-9 Bucs for the division title. Win, and they're in, just like 2014. But even if they lose, there's a back door if the Falcons beat the Saints on Sunday to force a three-way tie.

It's messy, and it's the NFC Southest way to make the playoffs, but once you get there, the record doesn't matter.

Rivera's admiring it all from afar.

He's a fan of Dave Canales anyway, but seeing this first-time head coach push a team to a new place is a familiar story for him, and the fact that this year is playing out so similarly to one of his brings a smile to his face.

So, as he thinks about this current Panthers team, he has a familiar message, one he shared with that team in 2014 that no one thought was good enough to be a playoff team.

"If they asked me for my advice, the first thing I would tell those guys is it's not an accident that you're in position," Rivera said. "You've gone out, and you've beaten some good teams. Yeah, you've lost to some good teams too, but you've beaten some teams you weren't supposed to. And because you did that, that just tells you that you set your standard. You set your goal as to just how good you can be. I mean, that's the truth.

"Now what you've got to do is you've just got to be that good that day. Come Saturday against Tampa in Tampa, they just have to be the best team that day."

That's a lesson learned from experience.