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Scott Smith, Buccaneers.com, published 17 November 2003
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers continue to take every game into the fourth quarter. And they continue to find new ways to lose.
The defending NFL champions are now 4-6 and in dire straits in the NFC playoff chase after a 17-play, 98-yard drive by the Green Bay Packers scuttled yet another Buccaneer comeback. Green Bay won for the first time in six tries at Raymond James Stadium, holding on for a 20-13 victory. The Packers improved to 5-5 and moved ahead of the Bucs in the crowded field of conference playoff hopefuls.
“I apologize to the Tampa Bay fans,” said Head Coach Jon Gruden after the game. “That was not good enough. We’ve got six games to go. We’ve got mandatory work tomorrow and we expect every man to finish this season with authority.”
The Buccaneers have not won a game in which they trailed by 10 or more points since 1999. However, for three consecutive weeks they have erased such a deficit only to lose in the final period. This time, Packer QB Brett Favre converted two third downs and a fourth down on the fateful drive, giving the visiting team a 20-13 lead with nine minutes to play.
For once, Tampa Bay’s offense couldn’t come back.
Faced with the same field position that launched Green Bay’s winning drive, the Bucs went three-and-out and punted with just over three minutes to play. The Packers, who rushed for 190 yards on the afternoon, ran off all but 25 seconds of the remaining time with six carries, gaining two first downs right into the teeth of the Buc defense.
In fact, both teams ran the ball very well, with the Bucs countering with 154 rushing yards. However, the Packers did so in a more methodical manner behind workhorse Ahman Green and bruising backup Najeh Davenport, while most of Tampa Bay’s yards came on two big plays. Thomas Jones, acquired in the offseason from Arizona in exchange for WR Marquise Walker, had a breakout day, his finest as a Buccaneer by far. Jones set up the Bucs’ first field goal in the second quarter and their first touchdown in the third quarter with breakaway runs. The first covered 61 yards and the second 51 to make Jones the first player in franchise history with two 50-plus yard runs in the same game. He is the first Buc back to have two such runs in the same season since Warrick Dunn in 2000.
Jones finished with 134 yards on nine carries and added 11 yards on two catches. Michael Pittman, who had led the team in rushing in each of its first nine games, carried just eight times for 18 yards, though he did catch four passes for another 22 yards. Both of Jones’ long runs came on toss-sweeps around left end, as the Bucs tried to run away from the Packers’ big tackles and around undersized end Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila, who finished with two sacks. Jones’ second carry looked as if it would be a 65-yard touchdown when the back bounced off Antuan Edwards’ tackle attempt and got behind all the defenders, but S Darren Sharper dived and just clipped Jones’ foot, dropping him at the 14.
The Bucs got in the end zone three plays, however, in very familiar fashion. WR Keenan McCardell caught a three-yard scoring pass, giving him a career-high eight touchdowns on the year (including one on a fumble recovery). McCardell, who has scored 10 touchdowns in 12 regular season games at Raymond James Stadium, is closing in on the team single-season record of nine receiving scores. He finished the game with a team-high five receptions for 55 yards.
His score would be the Bucs’ only touchdown of the afternoon, however, in part because they couldn’t get their hands on the ball. The Packers controlled nearly 35 of the game’s 60 minutes, gaining 10 rushing first downs, while the Bucs failed on all but one of their 11 third-down tries. Favre, who has had some miserable outings in Raymond James, was held to 13 of 28 passing for 92 yards, but he committed just one turnover and wasn’t sacked, or even hurried very often. That brought the Bucs’ NFL-record streak of consecutive games with at least one sack to an end. The streak, which started in 1999, had just reached the record mark of 69 games last weekend in Carolina.
Brad Johnson completed 17 of 28 passes for 149 yards, but he was sacked three times and had two desperation heaves intercepted. Johnson has 19 touchdown passes on the season, closing in on his 2002 team record of 22. Throughout the week, Gruden had emphasized the importance of improving the team’s field position, but the Bucs couldn’t deliver, particularly in the early going. Green Bay started three of their first four drives at their own 49 or better, including two in Buccaneer territory. Those two drives resulted in a touchdown and a field goal, giving Green Bay a 10-point lead three minutes into the second quarter.
The Packers scored first on a 47-yard touchdown drive in the first quarter, converting three third downs on three tries. The first two were quick slants against Buc cornerbacks who were playing off, and the third was a shovel pass to RB Tony Fisher that resulted in a five-yard touchdown and the game’s first points. Minutes later, the Bucs escaped a third-and-11 at their own one with a good punt and a defensive stop, but Johnson fumbled on the next play and the Packers turned the game’s first turnover into Ryan Longwell’s 31-yard field goal. Jones appeared to swing the momentum back to the Bucs’ side with his 61-yard carry around left end on the first play of the next drive, but Green Bay held, forcing a field goal and holding onto a seven-point lead. The visitors then answered immediately with a 24-yard field goal drive following Najeh Davenport’s 56-yard kickoff return.
Tampa Bay cut the lead back to one touchdown just before halftime on Martin Gramatica’s 47-yard field goal. The Bucs gained possession at the midfield stripe with 14 seconds left in the second quarter and completed two quick passes to WR Keyshawn Johnson over the middle to set up the score. At halftime, Tampa Bay had actually out-gained Green Bay, 128 to 111 but had trouble sustaining drives thanks to a one-for-seven mark on third downs. That continued a disturbing trend of recent vintage, as the Bucs have converted five of 28 third-down tries in the first half over the last four games.
Penalties also continued to plague the Buccaneers. A 40-yard pass to TE Rickey Dudley was erased in the first quarter by a holding penalty on guard Kerry Jenkins, and consecutive false starts forced the Bucs into a first-and-20 to start another drive in the second quarter. After tying the game at 13-13 in the third quarter, the Bucs had another strong march going just into Packer territory when a personal foul on Kenyatta Walker and a holding penalty on Cornell Green killed it. In all, Tampa Bay was penalized eight times for 48 yards, in line with their season average of 8.2 for 82.7 coming into the game. “Obviously, we had numerous penalties on the offensive line today,” said Gruden. “Some were due to a lack of concentration. We had some technique errors and some critical penalties. Significant penalties once again knocked us backward.”
The Bucs were led on defense by CB Ronde Barber, who had a game-high 13 tackles. CB Tim Wansley had five tackles and broke up two passes and rookie S Travaris Robinson, playing extensively in the nickel defense for the first time this season, recorded his first career interception. The day had started with promise for the Buccaneers, who were playing at 4:15, after several of their likely NFC playoff chase competitors played at 1:00. At one point, St. Louis, New Orleans and Carolina were all losing late, but all three rallied for close victories. Thus, the Bucs fell behind eight other teams in the race, including the Packers.
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