Recommended off-season reading: `Great Expectations' Gary Shelton, The St.Petersburg Times, published 23 December 1996 As Gatorade celebrations go, it left a little to be desired. Then again, it isn't as if the Bucs have had a lot of practice. The game was over now, and the season with it, and Tony Dungy walked toward midfield feeling the joy of the day mingle with the disappointment of the season. Behind him, Regan Upshaw and Eric Curry approached with a Gatorade bucket and the dousing that has become a cliche in other stadiums. Here, however, the concept is new enough that the players couldn't quite get together on the fundamentals of approach, lift and pour. When it was done, the best you could say about the effort was that the coach wasn't all wet. The team, either. The Bucs finished 6-10, and the team poured Gatorade over Dungy. It won a meaningless game over Chicago, and it celebrated that things weren't all bad. What would have happened had the Bucs won eight? Parades? Confetti? Champagne? "I guess it's kind of a commentary on where this team has been," Dungy said. "I don't think I'll ever have another season where they pour Gatorade on me after 6-10. I think the expectations will be raised now, and they should be." On the other hand, if the dousing of the coach speaks volumes about the history of this franchise, it also screams loudly about the way the team feels about its coach. Somewhere between a 1-8 start and a 5-2 finish, the Bucs began to grow from a team going nowhere to a team going somewhere. But as Dungy walked off the field, the reality of the moment was not lost on him. Yes, he liked the improvement. Yes, he liked the finish. But his team was 6-10, a harsh, ugly record. "None of us are pleased," he said. "Six wins is disappointing. We came here to be in the playoffs. Even in the second half, it was bittersweet. I kept thinking about early in the season, when we weren't winning, when we didn't have the confidence. I think this is a better team than 6-10, but that's where we finished." Six-dash-ten. Stack it up against the records of teams in the past, and it really doesn't look like anything special. But the second half of this season, there has been a difference to this team. It looks young, hungry, improving. It looks like a team that will follow Dungy anywhere, starting with the playoffs. It was just about this time a year ago the Bucs went searching for a coach. They flirted with Jimmy Johnson, and they flirted with Steve Spurrier. But after this year, you could make an argument that perhaps the Bucs ended up with the best coach of them all. "Definitely," defensive tackle Warren Sapp said. "I never played for Jimmy Johnson, and I never played for Steve Spurrier. But I wouldn't trade Tony Dungy for Vince f------ Lombardi." "Given our circumstances, he might be the best choice," general manager Rich McKay said. "He withstood the storm, and it was a storm. With the stadium situation, you couldn't make a decision. It was definitely cloudy." Not Sunday. Sunday, it was warmth and sunshine and blue skies. The clouds seem to have disappeared. This is what a good finish will do. It makes you forget about how horrifyingly bad this team was in its first month. It makes you notice the growth. It makes you think about six victories instead of 10 losses. That said, it is time for the stakes be raised. Dungy knows that, too. "I'll be very disappointed if we aren't playing meaningful games in December and January next year," he said. "I expect us to be better." He expects more Gatorade down his back, too, if you want to know the truth. But not like this. Not by a team feeling good about itself despite losing four more games than it won. "I'm sure there will be," he said. "But not for a 6-10 season, or when we win a game to finish 8-8. If there is more Gatorade, I would expect it to come after a meaningful game." The thing is, Dungy expects the meaningful game to come, too. Even at 6-10, he allows his players to believe it, too. For once, hope doesn't seem all wet, either.