Game Review - Week 4

The Bucs went up to Carolina with the opportunity to take the lead in the Division, or be behind the Panthers by a game and face going to Indy after a loss. Thankfully, the Bucs continued to play as they have all season by starting out strong. The Bucs were able to continue that moment and essentially put the Panthers away early and simply run clock the rest of the game.

On Offense, the Bucs were able to come right out of the shoot and drive 71 yards for the opening score. Garcia continued his excellent effort in the passing game, and finished the drive off with a 3 yard run for the TD. While Galloway only had one catch in the game, Hilliard took advantage of the single coverage going for his first 100+ yard game as a Buc. His 4 catches on the opening drive set the tone early, as did the running of Caddy, who started off the game quitely running for good yardage. Caddy, dropped two passes, but was just starting to find the holes in the defense as he ripped off an 18 yard run play, only to go down back on his leg causing what is believed to be a patella tendon tear. He's out for the season now. Pittman and Graham came in for relief and racked up 138 yards rushing between the two. The other bad news is that Petitgout also had his knee injured, and now it appears he needs surgery to correct it, which means he's out as well. Thankfully, Donald Penn has come in and been pretty stellar at the LT spot, as there hasn't been a noticeable drop-off. Alex Smith was able to haul in several passes, becoming a nice relief valve for Garcia. Clayton also caught a nice intermediate pass for a first down that helped the Bucs get into scoring position. The ability of the offense to start out fast then grind the clock down with a lot of running late has helped them cement their leads and allow the defense to stay a little fresher. As Garcia continues to get more familiar with the offense and its weapons, we should expect the offense to become more capable.

On Defense, the Bucs were 23 seconds away from laying a goose egg on the Panthers. They held Steve Smith in check all game, and after some initial big hits on receivers, the drops started happening with some regularity. The Bucs had some problems getting Carr down early in the game, though they ended the game with 3 sacks and did manage to collapse the pocket more frequently as the game went on. But with the way the secondary and linebackers are playing in coverage, you almost don't need a pass rush. Buchannon basically shut down Smith, which left Ronde with the easy guys. June and Brooks helped keep the Tight Ends from being effective for much of the game. Ruud continue to play well and force another fumble, and worked with the other LB's and the safeties to shut down the Panthers' running attack for much of the game. Phillips continues to play lights out, picking off another player and hitting some guys hard. Jackson managed to force another Foster fumbler that the Bucs recovered. Overall, the defense continues to get stingier and stingier each week. If not for the last minute 60 yard TD drive, the Bucs would have held the Panthers scoreless and well under 200 yards of offense. The pass rush is slowly getting better with White, Haye, and Peterson starting to make plays more regularly. Chukwurah showed some push on the edge, regularly getting into Carr's vision and making him a little nervous. Adams is still having trouble consistently beating the Tackles, but there were occasional signs. One play of his that did stand out was a screen pass that he recognized immediately and broke free from the Tackle to pursue, but he tripped up forcing a linebacker to make the actual tackle. Adams is clearly reading plays well, but needs to get the moves down and some more upper body strength to get past Tackles more consistently. The defense is really starting to look very good, and you wonder what will happen if the pass rush comes together.

On Special Teams, the coverage units continued to do a very good job only allowing one decent kick return, by Williams, and otherwise stuffing Goings for less than 20 yards a return. The punt returns against were non-existent. The kick and punt return teams did pretty well, though not great. Jones continues to give solid returns, especially in the punting game where he averaged over 14 yards per punt return. Clayton started the unit off with a nice return to the 29 yard line. The punting and kicking were solid again. Overall, another strong performance in all phases.

Coaching continues to have this team well prepared and playing exceptionally well. The Bucs only had one penalty, a delay of game that they took on purpose to give Bidwell 5 more yards of kicking room. Gruden's offense continues to exploit the opposing defense early and then he switches over to "eat clock" mode making it tough for the opposing offense to get back on the field and challenge the defense. Gruden looked pretty happy at the end of the game and could be seen congratulating the defensive players as they came off the field. Monte had another stellar effort from his defense. The secondary is being coached very well, and playing unbelievable. The whole unit is tackling well and hitting hard. They are also ganging up on ball carriers, making it tough for teams to rip off big gains. Special Teams coaching continues to be solid across the board. This team is not only playing great, but it's playing like a team, and a very close knit one at that. From the coaches to the players, you can see the team mentality. It starts at the top and trickles down to the 53rd player. How far this team will go is hard to say, but they look pretty good right now, even after losing Luke and Caddy.