Tampa Bay Buccaneers 29 Baltimore Colts 26 Sunday 9 September 1979 at Memorial Stadium CBS COMMENTARY CREW Lindsey Nelson and Paul Hornung
The Bucs fought back from a 17-0 first quarter deficit to go into overtime where Bill Kollar's fumble recovery set up Neil O'Donoghue's game-winning fieldgoal after 1:41 of the extra period. The Bucs' kicker had earlier missed two extra points, but fortunately his counterpart Linhart missed one of his own to make his 38-yard fieldgoal only the tying score rather than the winning one. The Bucs recorded 10 sacks of Greg Landry and it was the last of these by Randy Crowder, that led to the decisive fumble. Never before in their brief history had the Bucs come from so far behind to win a game and it put them alone atop of the Central Division for the first time.
STARTERS OFFENSE DEFENSE LT 75 Reavis LDE 60 Chambers LG 64 Horton NT 77 Kollar C 50 Wilson RDE 63 Selmon RG 61 Roberts LOLB 57 Lewis RT 73 Hannah LILB 58 Selmon WR 85 Owens RILB 54 Wood WR 81 Hagins ROLB 56 Johnson TE 88 Giles LCB 45 White FB 43 Eckwood SS 33 Cotney RB 42 Bell FS 34 Brown QB 12 Williams RCB 40 Washington PLAYED 6 O'Donoghue, 16 Blanchard, 23 Ragsdale, 25 Jordan, 27 T Davis, 36 Berns, 38 J Davis, 44 Cesare, 46 Reece, 51 Nafziger, 53 Bonness, 55 Brown, 66 Yarno, 69 Austin, 70 Carlton, 71 Crowder, 74 Sanders, 84 Jones, 86 Obradovich, 87 Mucker DID NOT PLAY 14 Fusina, 15 Rae, 79 Lewis
GAME SCORING BAL 11:03-1Q Hardemann 4 pass from Landry (Linhart kick) BAL 5:24-1Q Linhart FG24 BAL 3:55-1Q Hardemann 1 run (Linhart kick) TB 10:39-2Q Bell 1 run (kick failed) TB 7:06-2Q Hagins 9 pass from Williams (O'Donoghue kick) TB 14:44-4Q Washington 49 interception return (O'Donoghue) TB 10:57-4Q Jones 37 pass from Williams (kick failed) BAL 7:13-4Q DeRoo 67 pass from Landry (kick failed) BAL 1:26-4Q Linhart FG38 TB 13:19-OT O'Donoghue FG31
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS RUSHING BUCS: Eckwood 19-53, Bell 10-34, Berns 4-9, Williams 3-8, Ragsdale 1-3, J.Davis 1-0. COLTS: Hardemann 18-58, McCauley 8-28, Landry 3-5, Garry 6-1. PASSING BUCS: Williams 29-10-196-2-2. COLTS: Landry 37-22-183-2-2. RECEIVING BUCS: Bell 3-56, Hagins 2-35, Owens 2-31, Jones 1-37, J.Davis 1-24, Eckwood 1-13 . COLTS: Hardemann 7-24, McCauley 6-49, DeRoo 3-81, Garry 2-(-3), Doughty 1-16, Burke 1-9, Alston 1-4, McCall 1-3. INTERCEPTIONS BUCS: Washington 1-49, Wood 1-24. COLTS: Thompson 1-35, Shiver 1-3. KICK RETURNS BUCS: Ragsdale 1-19, T.Davis 1-16. COLTS: Leonard 3-70, Thompson 2-81, Callicut 2-23. PUNT RETURNS BUCS: Reece 7-54. COLTS: Glasgow 2-(-2). SACKS BUCS: L.Selmon 2-19, Lewis 2-12, Crowder 2-9, Washington 1-11, Jordan 1-9, Chambers 1-6, Kollar 1-3. COLTS: none.
VIDEO CLIPS Ricky Bell started the comeback with a one-yard touchdown run Randy Crowder’s strip-sack of Greg Landry was the decisive play in OT Neil O’Donoghue then won the game with a 31-yard fieldgoal