The Tampa Bay Buccaneers managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory Thursday night in Atlanta against the Falcons.
The team had the game in hand, a three point lead with the game clock winding down and possession of the ball deep in Atlanta territory. Then the spirit of Nick Sirianni possessed head coach Todd Bowles and the entire team. All the Bucs needed to do was run it three times, kick a field goal and give the ball back to Atlanta with seconds left on the clock.
But they didn’t, and found themselves punting to the Falcons and having to put the game back in the defenses hands. A defense that had already given up nearly 500 yards on the day.
This was a winnable game, this should’ve never gone to overtime, but it did. And quarterback Baker Mayfield knows why and owned it during the postgame press conference.
“We have to find a way to finish that game out on offense. I think about the first half, missing that shot to [wide receiver Sterling Shepard] ‘Shep’ should have been a touchdown, but it ended up as three points.”
“I’m just replaying that one over in my head that maybe [the game] shouldn’t have even been an overtime situation. So we have to make the plays when they’re there, and then in the second half, we just got to take care of the football and then got to finish on offense. I think that offensively, we’ll look back at the tape and realize that we didn’t exactly execute in the second half.”
Yes rookie Bucky Irving fumbled the ball in a key situation. Of course in hindsight Lavonte David should’ve batted down the ball from Kirk Cousins instead of intercepting it. But none of that matters if the team simply runs the ball three times and kicks a field goal. Or as Mayfield said. “We have to find a way to finish that game out on offense.”
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