Bucs are dropping like flies, but this team flies onward Martin Fennelly, The Tampa Tribune, published 13 December 2010 Bryan Glazer headed for the winning locker room. He was laughing. Who wasn't? That's all the Bucs could do after what really actually happened at FedEx Field, just shake their heads, laugh a little and win a little, as if any win is little right now. They escaped the cold and rain to warm their hands by a playoff chase they clung to Sunday, even if they hung on by their fingernails. "It was fingertip close all day," Bucs defensive end Stylez G. White said. "But we're alive." Whether the Bucs deserved it or not, an extra-point snap and slick football that Washington holder Hunter Smith couldn't hold, that was the difference. That's how the Bucs finished with one extra point more against the hapless Redskins, 17-16. The game was an eyesore, a regular modern-art masterpiece, so crazed, so confusing that at one point it looked like Washington got a fifth down, though it didn't. The Bucs were often outplayed. When Washington kept trying to give it away (two missed field goal tries, fumbled kickoff), the guys from Tampa kept giving it back. It could have slipped through their fingers, just as Josh Freeman lost the ball down at the Washington goal line. But it didn't. The winning touchdown could have slipped through Kellen Winslow's fingers. But it didn't. Winslow made a great grab off a great Freeman throw and ran it in. The Bucs tried to blow this game to the very end. The defense couldn't stop a Redskins march in the final seconds. Donovan McNabb to Santana Moss for six points on fourth-and-goal from the Bucs' 6 seemed to spell overtime. But it didn't. "I was getting ready," Freeman said. If the Bucs had lost this game, the Metrodome's Teflon wouldn't have been the only roof that caved in Sunday. Lose and it's 7-6. Lose and … "It's over," Winslow said. "It's over." The playoffs live, though we're not sure the Bucs will have enough bodies for them. Add two more starters to the late-season butcher's bill, Gerald McCoy and Quincy Black. "We got guys dropping like flies," Stylez G. said. The Bucs tried mightily to lose this game. The Redskins had 272 yards of offense in the first half, 174 of it on the ground, with Ryan Torain passing 100 yards rushing with five minutes left in the first quarter. Raheem Morris' guys were getting pushed around by a bad football team. The Redskins led 10-3, but it should have been 16-3, or 24-3. "How we were down only seven points at halftime is a godsend," Ronde Barber said. I'm pretty sure God had turned off the game by then. Through three quarters, Connor Barth led his teammates 9-0. And when Freeman fumbled at the Washington 1 early in the fourth quarter, it seemed like a killer. "There were a lot of could-be killers today," Barrett Ruud said. Only the Redskins, sinking fast, were not about to let the Bucs out of town with a loss. With four minutes left, Freeman's throw barely cleared a Redskins' fingers and barely found Winslow's. "I didn't really actually see him make the catch," Freeman said. "I kind of saw the ball going over there and I'm like, 'Please catch it.' " No. 5 then fought his way to the 2-point conversion, with point No.?2 meaning everything. "We needed to find a way to win this game," Barber said. So what if the Redskins beat them to it? The Falcons and Saints are keeping their distance, but the Bears and Packers lost Sunday. Green Bay has five losses, just like the Bucs. And the 8-4 Giants play a road game tonight. We assume Brett Favre was buried in the Metrodome avalanche but was rescued by dogs, revived by paramedics and now will start. Just remember: Nobody goes into Detroit and beats the Vikings. Yes, it was a crazy day all around the NFL. And those crazy Bucs are alive. They're dropping like flies, but fly on. "Does it matter how?" Stylez G. White said. "One point, 10 points, 30 points, we're taking it. You throw us a bone, we're taking it." He laughed. Hey, who didn't?