CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Carolina Panthers starting left tackle Ickey Ekwonu has been ruled out of the remainder of Saturday’s wild-card game against the Los Angeles Rams with a right knee injury.
Ekwonu went down on Carolina’s second possession holding his knee following a Rams sack and remained on the ground for several minutes as several players gathered around him on one knee.
Ekwonu eventually got up and walked off the field under his own power. But after being examined by the medical staff, he climbed onto the cart and headed to the locker room.
Yosh Nijman replaced Ekwonu at left tackle.
Not long after Ekwonu went down, Panthers right guard Robert Hunt headed to the blue medical tent with a pectoral injury, tossing his helmet in frustration as he reached the sideline. Hunt, who had returned this week after missing 15 games with a torn triceps and was hoping to provide a boost to the running game, missed two offensive series but was able to return in the second half.
For the Rams, cornerback Ahkello Witherspoon left with a shoulder injury in the second quarter and did not return. He was downgraded to out in the third quarter.
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Carolina Panthers offensive tackle Ikem Ekwonu (79) goes down with an injury during the first half of an NFL wild-card playoff football game against the Los Angeles Rams, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Jacob Kupferman)
A Ukrainian drone strike killed one person and wounded three others in the Russian city of Voronezh, local officials said Sunday.
A young woman died overnight in a hospital intensive care unit after debris from a drone fell on a house during the attack on Saturday, regional Gov. Alexander Gusev said on Telegram.
Three other people were wounded and more than 10 apartment buildings, private houses and a high school were damaged, he said, adding that air defenses shot down 17 drones over Voronezh. The city is home to just over 1 million people and lies some 250 kilometers (155 miles) from the Ukrainian border.
The attack came after Russia bombarded Ukraine with hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles overnight into Friday, killing at least four people in the capital Kyiv, according to Ukrainian officials. For only the second time in the nearly four-year war, Russia used a powerful new hypersonic missile that struck western Ukraine in a clear warning to Kyiv and NATO.
Ukraine’s largest private energy supplier, DTEK, said Sunday that 30,000 people in Kyiv were still without power following the attack. Mayor Vitali Klitschko said around half the apartment buildings — nearly 6,000 — in snowy Kyiv were left without heat in daytime temperatures of about minus 8 degrees Celsius (17.6 Fahrenheit).
The intense barrage and the launch of the nuclear-capable Oreshnik missile followed reports of major progress in talks between Ukraine and its allies on how to defend the country from further aggression by Moscow if a U.S.-led peace deal is struck.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Saturday in his nightly address that Ukrainian negotiators “continue to communicate with the American side.”
Chief negotiator Rustem Umerov was in contact with U.S. partners on Saturday, he said.
Separately, Ukraine’s General Staff said Russia targeted Ukraine with 154 drones overnight into Sunday and 125 were shot down.
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry’s main intelligence directorate said Sunday that Russia this month deployed the new jet-powered “Geran-5” strike drone against Ukraine for the first time. The Geran is a Russian variant of the Iranian-designed Shahed.
According to the directorate, the drone can carry a 90-kilogram (200-pound) warhead and has a range of nearly 1,000 kilometers (620 miles).
Follow the AP’s coverage of the war in Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine
This photo provided by the Ukrainian Security Service on Friday, Jan. 9, 2026, shows a fragment believed to be a part of a Russian Oreshnik intermediate range hypersonic ballistic missile that hit the Lviv region. (Ukrainian Security Service via AP)
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy, second left, listens to British Defense Secretary John Healey during their meeting in Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026. (AP Photo/Danylo Antoniuk)
