Bounced Rick Stroud, The St.Petersburg Times, published 19 November 2001 Hello, hello, hel-lo-o-o way down there. Can you still hear the groans of the crowd from where you are, Tampa Bay Bucs? Bucs? ... Bucs? Make no mistake. The Bucs have not just dug a hole for themselves, they've fallen into a bottomless well. That was the feeling after their 27-24 loss to the Bears on Sunday at Raymond James Stadium. The Bucs (4-5) plummeted faster than the football after it hit the right upright on Martin Gramatica's 48-yard field goal that would have sent the game into overtime on the final play. Of course, it never should have come to that. Chicago used 17 points in the third quarter to build a 24-9 lead, thanks mostly to two of the three touchdown passes from quarterback Jim Miller to receiver Marty Booker. As they have so many times this season, the Bucs rallied to within a field goal on Brad Johnson's 1-yard run and his two-point conversion pass to Mike Alstott with 2:29 left. They even had a chance after getting the ball with no timeouts at their 32-yard line with 18 seconds left. Two completions to Warrick Dunn, coupled with an unnecessary roughness penalty moved the ball to the Bears 31 with 6 seconds remaining. But it's the Bears who hold all the rabbit's feet this season, while the Bucs stand under ladders. "He's always dancing," Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher said of Gramatica. "He's dancing before the kick. He's dancing after the kick. I guess he's not dancing now." Certainly, the Bucs cannot dance around the fact that they did not deserve to win. Tampa Bay committed four turnovers, including a Johnson interception by safety Tony Parrish with 1:53 remaining. The Bucs also missed on a fake punt that led to the Bears' winning field goal, a 40-yarder by Lakeland's Paul Edinger. "This game was huge," Dunn said. "Every game after that is a must-win. Did we put a lot of pressure on ourselves? Yeah. Did we put a lot of pressure on Coach (Tony) Dungy? Yeah. And it's not fair. This is on the players." The victory gave the Bears (7-2) sole possession of first place in the Central ahead of Green Bay (6-3), which was upset earlier in the day by Atlanta. "It's never over," Parrish said. "If you've watched the Bears this year, you know the game is never over until the last tick goes off and everybody floods the field." Meanwhile, Tampa Bay must try to salvage its season on Monday Night Football at St. Louis, which has the best record in the NFL at 8-1. "Great teams, when the opportunity presents itself, seize the moment," John Lynch said. "We haven't been doing that." Of all the plays that the Bucs wish they had back this season, there was one Sunday that will be talked about at water coolers around the Tampa Bay area for several months. Johnson, who set a team-record with 40 completions in 56 attempts for 399 yards, cut the lead to 24-16 early in the fourth quarter by leading a 78-yard drive, capped by Alstott's 1-yard run. But trailing by eight on fourth and 6 at their 26 with 9:37 remaining, Mark Royals attempted the fake punt. His pass to Aaron Stecker was complete, but Stecker fell a yard short of a first down. To make matters worse, the Bucs had taken the fake punt off. But the signal that was to be given by Stecker slapping his thigh was not read by Royals. Stecker was in as the upback because Rabih Abdullah had a concussion. "I rely on hand signals to check me in or out of it. That wasn't communicated," Royals said. "After I realized that it wasn't on, after I had the ball, I probably should've kicked it. That's easy to say now. I was hoping somebody would break free. I was just looking for anything at that point. It was obviously a big play in the game." Instead of needing a TD and 2-point conversion, which they eventually got, the Bucs soon trailed by 11. Instead of Gramatica attempting a game-winner, his miss made his team a loser. "There's nothing worse for a kicker," Gramatica said. "Your whole team is depending on you and you just don't come through for them. There's no excuse. I just didn't make the field goal." Of course, the Bucs lost the game before that, during an 11-minute stretch to start the third quarter in which the Bears ripped apart Tampa Bay's defense for touchdown passes of 44 and 66 yards to Booker, who caught seven for 165 yards. On one, cornerback Ronde Barber, who was bumped on a pick play, recovered to stay with Booker until he lost sight of the football. On the second TD of the quarter, safety Dexter Jackson bit on a play-action fake and didn't provide help for cornerback Brian Kelly. The Bucs seemed surprised by the Bears' vertical passing game, which had been mostly non-existent after an injury to deep threat Marcus Robinson. "Coming into this game, they hadn't really taken the ball downfield in the passing game," Lynch said. "Maybe that factored into it. We just didn't expect that." Meanwhile, the Bucs offense rested entirely on Johnson's arm. Tampa Bay rushed for 19 yards on 15 carries, the fifth-lowest total in team history. "We've got some warriors in there, but you also have to play good football," offensive coordinator Clyde Christensen said. "You have to not turn the ball over and convert some big plays. You love the heart, but every team has heart. Chicago has heart. They've come back, too. It doesn't help unless you finish it." After watching rookie Anthony Thomas nearly lose a fumble with the Bears trying to run out the clock, coach Dick Jauron ordered Miller to take a knee, leaving 18 seconds for the Bucs to work with.