Winston, Martin have record days in Bucs’ 45-17 win over Eagles Roy Cummings, The Tampa Tribune, published 23 November 2015 The Buccaneers spent a little more time than usual celebrating their 45-17 victory over the Eagles inside their quaint Lincoln Financial Field locker room late Sunday afternoon. Why? Well, quite frankly, it took them a while to hand out all the game balls. On a cold, blustery day during which the Bucs reached the .500 mark for the first time in eight weeks to claim a spot on the outer edges of the NFC playoff race, their stars came out. And boy, did they ever shine. Linebacker Lavonte David had two interceptions, including one for a touchdown, defensive tackle Gerald McCoy had 1.5 sacks and wide receivers Vincent Jackson and Mike Evans each had a touchdown reception. At the end of the day, though, they were nothing more than co-stars, because the headliners on this day were rookie quarterback Jameis Winston and running back Doug Martin. Coming off a pair of games in which he’d failed to throw a touchdown pass against two interceptions, Winston set a rookie franchise record by throwing five touchdown passes to five different receivers. He also tied an NFL record shared by the Bears’ Ray Buivid (1937) and the Lions’ Matthew Stafford (2009) for most touchdown passes by a rookie in a game, as well as the Bucs franchise record for most touchdown passes in a game. Martin, meanwhile, had the longest run in franchise history at 84 yards, and his 235 rushing yards were the second-most in franchise history, behind his 251-yard effort as a rookie at Oakland in 2012. “That was insane,’’ McCoy said of the performances the Bucs received from Winston and Martin. “It’s great when one of your dilemmas is, ‘Who’s going to win Player of the Week?’ That was just crazy.’’ The only thing crazier is the Bucs’ place in the playoff race. A team that had no right to even utter the word playoffs two weeks ago is just one game out a wild-card berth, tied with Seattle for seventh overall in the NFC. But that’s what winning consistently can do for a team. And with back-to-back wins for the first time in two years — Tampa Bay broke the NFL’s longest active streak without consecutive wins at 31 games — the Bucs can actually say they’re doing that. Since a 1-3 start under second-year coach Lovie Smith, the Bucs have won four of their past six games to reach 5-5. And they’ve done it the past two weeks with solid contributions from both the offense and the defense. While the offense gained 521 yards, the most in 35 years and second-most in franchise history, the defense forced three takeaways and held an opponent to 17 points or fewer for the second time in as many weeks. “I’ve talked a lot about how we’re making progress,’’ Smith said. “Everyone would like for their favorite team to peak the first week of the season, but that normally doesn’t happen. It takes a while.’’ It took a while Sunday. After defensive end Jacquies Smith recovered a fumble, but was ruled to fumble it away again on the third play of the game, the Eagles drove 86 yards in seven plays to take a 7-0 lead. The Bucs tightened up after that, though, surrendering just 297 yards, including 197 passing, while never allowing the Eagles to move past the Tampa Bay 20-yard line. We just had to calm down,’’ David said of the Bucs, who struggled initially to adapt to the Eagles fast-paced, spread-option attack. “That first series, we had a couple guys scrambling around and everybody was trying to get the calls real fast. There were just a couple of missed communication calls here and there. But once we settled down everybody started communicating better and we were able to play our style of defense.’’ The Bucs offensive style is to run the ball to set up play-action passes downfield. They managed to stick to that pattern from the beginning, thanks mostly to Martin. After breaking an 11-yard gain on the first offensive play of the day, he added a 58-yard run four plays into the second drive and finished the first half with what amounted to a season-best 177 yards rushing. “I don’t go into a game thinking I’m going to get these kinds of stats,’’ Martin said. “I really just want to let the game come to me, and today everything was clicking for us.’’ It was clicking for Winston, too, especially on third down. He came into the game with a 64.1 passer rating on third down, but produced a 132.2 rating against the Eagles, completing nine of 12 throws for 81 yards, three touchdowns and no interceptions. “It was a great game plan,’’ Winston said. “And guys are playing with confidence. When guys are confident, it’s hard to stop them.’’ All of a sudden, the entire Bucs team is playing with confidence. But oddly, it was Winston, the emerging leader of this team, who at the end of the day put their most recent achievements in perspective. “I know Tampa Bay is happy, because this is the first back-to-back win we’ve had in a long time,” Winston said. “But we can’t get complacent. Two wins in a row, that’s good, but when you think about it, two wins a row, that should be expected. Hopefully we can get on a roll.”