Monday, 4 a.m.
It was supposed to be the biggest speed bump remaining. The unwinnable game. The toughest opponent still standing.
And the Tampa Bay Bucs, in perhaps their finest game of the season, won in a runaway.
As the Bucs approached their final run of the season, this game looked like the toughest test. A good San Diego team…in San Diego…with half of the defense injured. And when it was over, the Bucs had left cleat marks all over the Chargers.
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Tampa Bay won, 40-17, running roughshod over the top scoring defense in the NFL.
And in it:
— Mike Evans caught eight passes for 159 yards and two touchdowns. Evans now has 749 yards on the season.
— Bucky Irving ran for 117 yards with just 15 carries. As a team, the Bucs ran for 222 yards. Irving now has 852 yards on the season.
— Baker Mayfield threw for four touchdown passes. Mayfield has 3,617 yards and 32 touchdowns on the season.
— And a maligned defense shut out the Chargers in the second half. In the opening half, San Diego quarterback Justin Herbert had thrown for two touchdowns and had a rating of 138.0. In the second half, he threw for just 65 yards. His third-quarter rating was 24.1; his fourth quarter was 60.4.
It all came after the Bucs had struggled in the second quarter, turning the ball over twice on an interception and a fumble.
“We didn’t panic,” Bucs coach Todd Bowles said. “We made some mistakes in the first half and turned it over twice. We understood the assignments and showed the growth of a team over the second half of the season, that we can come back take games away.”
The Bucs outgained the Chargers on the ground 222-32.
“That’s huge,” Bowles said. “It’s December football. We’re trying to run it and we’re trying to stop the run.
“It seems like Bucky has one of those every week.”
It was Evans’ biggest game of the year, and it showed he may finally be healthy,
“He did a heck of a job,” Bowles said. “He did everything we needed. He’s our bell cow. We’re going to need him down the stretch.
“I think he’s a guaranteed Hall of Famer. He steps up and plays big. You can’t put a price on what he does for this team from a mental standpoint, a physical standpoint, a team standpoint. He’s everything a player aspires to be. He’s tough. He does a great job in the community. He comes up big with plays whether you’re singling him or doubling him. We couldn’t ask anything more than what he does.”
It leaves the Bucs a game and a half up on the Atlanta Falcons, who play tonight against the Raiders in Las Vegas.
The Bucs travel to Dallas to play the Cowboys Sunday night at 8:20 p.m.
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