CHARLOTTE — The score was 8-7, with the offense trailing.

"In my mind, I was trying to figure out a creative tiebreaker," head coach Dave Canales shared following Tuesday's practice.

The offense was in the red zone, with practice winding down and searching for anything. As Andy Dalton zipped one through the middle, Shemar Bartholomew popped the ball out of its path and pulled it in for the interception. As the second-year defensive back raced the other way down the field for an pick-six (or as much of a pick-six as you can have in practice), someone on the defense yelled, "That's a point for us!"

But wait, eight is not a normal score in football, an interception isn't categorized as one point, and why would Canales need to prepare for a tiebreaker?

"The tally is just, it's a point for—you got to get 4 (yards) or more on a run for the offense to win. If defense stops them, then that's a point for the defense," Canales explained of the game within the game that the Panthers have started playing every day at practice. "An incomplete is a point for the defense. Completion is a point. Interceptions count for two. Touchdown counts for three."

Canales and general manager Dan Morgan have preached the same message since taking their respective roles, with an increase in volume this past offseason: everything will be a competition. The position battles, the spots on special teams, the games Canales sometimes set up at the end of the day, and every layer of practice will all be good-natured but a competition nonetheless, with the plan it carries over to the field.

"So we just kind of keep the score, try to keep score on everything we do," Canales said. "With these guys, I mean, as soon as you put a scoreboard up, it matters, and the energy goes up. So we love doing that.

"I mean, we talk about it all the time. We make us. It's the matchups every day of practice that make us who we are."

The competition begets energy, which in turn begets success. It's early June; there is still a long road to travel before the season is even here, so the chance to make a practice vibrate with excitement as opposed to becoming monotonous is one the Panthers will take.

"I love seeing the juice, all the whole group just running down, and of course, great the cameras were here, they're practicing their celebrations and all that," Canales joked. "So we love it, but you know I just told the guys this energy comes from them. It comes from knowing what to do. It comes from bringing that personality.

"They're the ones that put the color. Coaches, we're here to set the foundation of it and the information, but becoming us and the identity of who we are comes from the players."

The philosophy fed into how the Panthers drafted this past spring and how they assessed free agency. One of those guys was outside linebacker Patrick Jones II, coming from the Minnesota Vikings, a defense that injected energy into everything they did last season. Now, he sees it forming in his new team.

"That's what it's all about, man. People take it real seriously. It is a serious game, but at the end of the day, it's a game," Jones said.

"So whenever people get together, and you see the whole team celebrating like that and everybody having fun, that's when you know that's just the beginning of building something very special."