Win sends Bucs Packing - Postseason frustration put to rest Pat Yasinskas, The Tampa Tribune, published 29 December 1997 When an 18-year Ice Age ends, floodgates become useless. The thaw builds and grows and nothing can stop it. Especially not the Detroit Lions. The flood of postseason frustration, accumulated through years of mediocrity and despair, destroyed everything in its path Sunday. That includes the house of horrors that has been Houlihan's Stadium for most of the last 22 years. Barring a minor miracle, the Bucs sent the old facility out with what would seem like a major miracle in other years. On a field that had been soaked by last week's rains, the Bucs built a dam around Barry Sanders and captured their first playoff victory since the 1979 season. In front of a sell-out crowd of 73,361 and an international television audience, the Bucs - once and for all - proved their turnaround season was no fluke. A swarming defense bottled up Sanders and the offense worked to near perfection in a 20-10 victory against the Detroit Lions in an NFC wild-card game. "It's big in the sense that it starts to put more of yesterday behind us," General Manager Rich McKay said. "Every time we get over another hurdle, we get less articles about yesterday and more articles about today and the future." The future hasn't been this bright in ages. The Bucs (11-6) will travel to Green Bay to play the defending Super Bowl champion Packers Sunday in the NFC Divisional Playoffs. The Bucs only would return to Houlihan's Stadium for the NFC Championship Game if they upset the Packers, then play the Minnesota Vikings, who would have to upset the San Francisco 49ers on Saturday. "I have chills right now," Derrick Brooks said. "A win like this will put chills in you." Brooks wasn't talking about the prospect of playing in freezing temperatures in Green Bay. Instead, he was talking about the emotions of a team that began the day with very little postseason experience. But you couldn't tell from the way the Bucs played. "That's the biggest win we've had all year," Hardy Nickerson said. "We've been in a lot of big games this year, but this one was the absolute biggest." That's because the Bucs did the unthinkable. They stopped Sanders. The third man in NFL history to rush for 2,000 yards in a season was held to a paltry (by his standards) 65 yards on 18 carries. That's the first time since Week Two, when the Bucs beat the Lions, 24-17, in Detroit that Sanders had been contained. Since that game, Sanders had reeled off an NFL-record 14 consecutive 100-yard games. The Bucs held Sanders to 15 yards on six carries in the first half on the way to building a 13-0 lead. "If you can keep Barry to 15-17 carries you've got a chance," Tony Dungy said. "If he gets above that, the law of averages catches up with you." But nothing caught up with the Bucs, who said they were tired of hearing about Sanders. "It's not like he's going to come out and rip us apart," Warren Sapp said. "We're a pretty good defense ourselves. We had 11 guys on a mission." Mission accomplished. Besides stopping Sanders, the Bucs limited Detroit's other top weapons - Scott Mitchell (10 of 25 for 78 yards and an interception) and receiver Herman Moore (four catches for 44 yards). Mitchell left the game late in the third quarter with a concussion and the Bucs kept backup Frank Reich in check. "Our defense was spectacular once again," Trent Dilfer said. "They carried more than their share of the load." But, sometimes, the best defense is a good offense. With Dilfer completing 13 of 26 passes for 181 yards and Warrick Dunn and Mike Alstott combining for 140 yards on the ground, the Bucs were able to keep Sanders off the field. The Bucs kept the ball for 31 minutes and 37 seconds. Detroit had just two first downs in the first half as the Bucs forced the Lions to the air. "That's the best recipe to stop these guys," John Lynch said. "The best way to keep them down is to keep them off the field." But it was tough to keep the Bucs off the field after the game. They celebrated with their long-suffering fans as fireworks went off around the stadium. "It's been a long time and there's been a lot of suffering," Nickerson said. "But this is a well-appreciated moment for everybody."