Game Review - Week 9

The Bucs beat the Cardinals 17-10 in game that they thoroughly dominated, but had another long drive go without points due to the combination of a dropped TD pass, followed by a missed chip shot field goal. Some stupid mistakes occurred in this game, but the Bucs managed to pull out the win and get into the BYE week on a winning note. Now they can rest some and recover from a long 9 week rest free streak of games. So how did they do in this game?

On Offense, the Bucs came out mixing their running game with their passing game. Down 3 points after one big play got the Cardinals into Field Goal range, the offense took their opening possession and took it 77 yards down the field starting out with 3 runs, 3 passes, 1 run, 1 pass (turned into a scramble), 1 run, and a 37 yard pass for a TD. Graham's effectiveness coming out running the ball, allowed the Bucs to get Galloway down the field, even though there was some coverage in the area. There was just enough space that Joey could take the pass away and slip a tackle for the TD. From then on it was all Bucs, despite a stint when both teams punted the ball back and forth. The Bucs eventually began to impose their will on the Cardinals, rushing 46 times for 162 yards (3.5 per). That combined with Garcia's ability to find someone to convert 3rd downs (where Hilliard excelled), allowed the Bucs to chew up a team record 43:07 off the clock. That left the Cardinals potent offense with barely more than one quarter's worth of time to do anything. Even though the Bucs gave up 3 sacks, they typically won the battle at the line of scrimmage. The only are they really struggled was running on the perimeter where the Cardinals used speed to close off the edges. Garcia finished the game with a 96.7 rating hitting 18 of 28 passes for 196 yards and a TD (should have been 19 of 28 and 2 TD's!). Graham, however, was the story of the game, as he was called on to pull most of the load and continued to run with his typical style of finding the hole with vision, getting into the hole, and managing to run through tackles and lean forward to constantly gain that extra 2 or 3 yards on virtually every run. Right now, his ability to constantly get positive yards is keeping the offense from getting in trouble when the running lanes aren't great. In this game, the lanes were there up the middle, and they took advantage of that. There were some stupid penalties (though one false start, called after Trueblood's, appeared to involve no movement at all; i.e. the refs are blind idiots). The last few plays of the game were ridiculous, including when they tried to snap the ball in the victory formation, only to have the Cardinal Nose Tackle hit the ball back towards Galloway. Somehow the refs missed it totally and called a false start on the offense. Go figure. In any case, the offense, except for failing to hit for a couple more TD's (Smith was wide open on the last pass play of the drive that ended with a made field goal), was exceptional and did what they needed to do.

On Defense, the Bucs got something of a break with the offense's performance. The defense only had to play for just 42 plays (compared to the offense's 77). Even for those 42 plays, with the exception of one big play on the opening drive of the game, and a couple of plays during the Cardinal's late TD drive, the defense shut the Cardinals down, and forced 7 punts, and took the ball away twice. Warner finished the day hitting 10 passes on 30 attempts and getting picked off twice; a passer rating of 26.0. Quite frankly, the defense, though it failed to register a sack, harassed and hit Warner all day long, and the Bucs nearly picked off several more passes, and finishing with an incredible 11 passes defensed. Combine that with a stout rush defense by the defensive line, helping the LB's limit James, and the other backs, to a combined 23 yards on 12 attempts. It wasn't pretty for the Cardinals, as the Bucs looked dominant on defense. On several occasions, Warner managed to connect with a receiver for good yardage, only to watch the receiver get separated from the ball. This happened at least 3 times, if not 4, that I can remember off-hand. Needless to say, Jackson and Phillips were playing the head hunter role quite well. What's really amazing is that the LB's hardly had to work, as they only combined for 5 combined tackles. The Defensive Line managed to get 14 tackles combined, which meant that the Cardinals weren't even getting past the line on most plays. On the few they did they were stopped by the LB's or the Safeties. To demonstrate how dominate this group was, the Cardinals got 59 yard on their first drive (47 on one play), and then got 3 total yards on their next 4 drives. They only had 73 yards on their first 7 drives. Then they got 32 (punt), then 85 (TD) then 0 on their last 2 drives. In all, 6 drives with 2 or less yards. Needless to say, the defense had Warner's number, and they shut that offense down. Impressive is hardly a good enough word to use for this performance.

On Special Teams, somebody forgot to keep the "Special" in this team during Field Goals. Bryant missed a 58 yard attempt before the end of the half (which is not something to hold against him), but then, after the Bucs longest and most dominate drive of the season, missed a 26 yard chip shot (only a few yards longer than an extra point!). That failure to score gave the Cardinals a shot in the arm, which they used to score a TD and make it close. The punt returns weren't very good, but the kickoffs were pretty solid behind Spurlock (all 2 of them - 1 kick went for a touchback). The absence of Jones is really hurting the punt returns, as Buchannon kept running around and backwards instead of just firing forward for every yard he could get. The coverage teams were excellent for most of the game. Stovall has become the new Cox on special teams, constantly making the tackle to stop the return. On the last punt of the game, Bidwell dropped a punt around the 16 yards line where the Cardinals' Breaston waited to catch the ball without a fair catch. Just a split second after he caught the ball, before he could even get his head down, Stovall nailed him with a tremendous hit. Quite frankly, the returner was lucky to hold onto the ball. Overall, the effort was solid, but not spectacular as a whole, but there where some great plays mixed in.

The coaching was pretty damn good for almost the whole game. Gruden, unfortunately, had a bad play late in the game by calling for a pass on 1st down 2 drives after the Cardinals' TD. That pass was incomplete to Galloway, stopping the clock and allowing the Cardinals to wait another play before burning their 2nd timeout. As the Bucs failed to pick up the 1st down on two straight run plays after, the Cardinals were able to save at least 40 seconds, using their timeouts to stop the clock and force the punt. That's when the defense came back on the field and performed just as well as they had for almost the entire game. Monte's group was great all day, and finished the Cardinals off by picking off Warner on the first play of the last Cardinals' drive, and did so before it was inside of 2 minutes, and right after they had burned their last timeout, so they couldn't challenge the call (I think the catch was good because there was a divot in the field and the refs could look right at the proof to settle their difference). Monte's troops took it to the Cardinals and held them to just 10 points. Special Teams coaching was mixed as Buchannon just couldn't seem to figure out how to run straight ahead and get what you can, and Bryant missed the chip shot. The coverage units were, however, solid, as was the kick return crew. Overall, despite some stupid mistakes likely caused by a team that hadn't had its BYE yet, the team played very well and dominated. Unlike the past two games, the domination was followed by a W in the W/L column, which makes it much better. Now they can get some rest, heal up, and come back out and take care of the Falcons.