The Bucs clinched their first playoff berth in 13 years with their biggest-ever road win against a totally depleted Lions team missing many of its coaching staff. Tom Brady had over 300 yards passing and four touchdowns before sitting out the entire second half as the benches were emptied to give everyone playing time. The shutout was only lost on a punt return score but even back-up QB Blaine Gabbert got in on the action with a pair of scoring passes.
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS RUSHING BUCS: Vaughn 15-62, Fournette 9-34, Gabbert 2-15. LIONS: Swift 10-45, Blough 1-18, Peterson 4-10. PASSING BUCS: Brady 27-22-348-0-4, Gabbert 15-9-143-0-2. LIONS: Stafford 3-2-17-0-0, Daniel 18-13-86-0-0, Blough 10-6-49-1-0. RECEIVING BUCS: Evans 10-181, Godwin 5-84, Brown 4-35, Fournette 3-32, Gronkowski 2-58, Brate 2-27, Johnson 1- 35, Hudson 1-20, Vaughn 1-7, Miller 1-7, McCoy 1-5. LIONS: Amendola 5-37, Swift 4-25, Hockenson 4-23, Jones 3-19, Sanu 2-22, Johnson 2-17, Cephus 1-9. INTERCEPTIONS BUCS: Miller 1-2. LIONS: none. KICK RETURNS BUCS: Barner 2-43. LIONS: Agnew 2-46. PUNT RETURNS BUCS: Barner 5-20. LIONS: Agnew 2-78. SACKS BUCS: White 1-11, Ledbetter 1-11, Nelson 1-10, Gholston 1-7. LIONS: Okwara 1-7.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers 47 Detroit Lions 7 Saturday 26 December 2020 at Ford Field
SCORING TB 11:43-1Q Gronkowski 33 pass from Brady (kick failed) TB 7:39-1Q Evans 27 pass from Brady (Succop kick) TB 11:51-2Q Fournette 4 run (Succop kick) TB 4:52-2Q Godwin 7 pass from Brady (Succop kick) TB 1:14-2Q Brown 12 pass from Brady (Succop kick) TB 14:50-3Q Gronkowski 25 pass from Gabbert (kick failed) DET 9:20-3Q Agnew 74 punt return (Prater kick) TB 7:07-3Q Evans 22 pass from Gabbert (Succop kick)
GAME REPORTS Rick Stroud gets to write about the playoffs for the first time in 13 years John Romano reports on Bruce Arians’ masterplan Mike Evans shines, but history is put on hold for another week Bucs flip the coin, and script, on first-quarter futility Not everything was special - Joey Knight’s notes column How Mitch Albom of the Detroit Free Press saw the game Scott Smith’s official game report Click here for the play-by-play and the NFL gamebook
COMMENTARY CREW Alex Amin and Mark Schlereth
GAME HIGHLIGHTS Click on the boxes below to view the big plays Mike Evans had a monster game including two touchdowns - this was the first Tom Brady’s fourth scoring pass of the first half went to Antonio Brown Even Blaine Gabbert got in on the act, throwing a touchdown to Gronkowski on his first pass
STARTERS OFFENSE DEFENSE LT 76 Smith DE 93 Suh LG 74 Marpet DT 56 Nunez-Roches C 66 Jensen LOLB 90 Pierre-Paul RG 65 Cappa LILB 45 White RT 78 Wirfs RILB 54 David TE 87 Gronkowski ROLB 58 Barrett WR 14 Godwin DB 43 Cockrell WR 13 Evans LCB 23 Murphy-Bunting WR 81 Brown RCB 35 Dean QB 12 Brady SS 31 Winfield RB 28 Fournette FS 33 Whitehead PLAYED 3 Succop, 8 Pinion, 10 Miller, 11 Gabbert, 18 Johnson, 25 McCoy, 26 Adams, 29 Smith, 30 Vaughn, 32 Edwards, 36 Miller, 44 Barner, 49 Gill, 51 Minter, 53 Russell, 64 Stinnie, 72 Wells, 73 Haeg, 79 O’Connor, 84 Brate, 88 Hudson, 92 Gholston, 95 Ledbetter, 96 McLendon, 97 Triner, 98 Nelson DID NOT PLAY INACTIVES 4 Griffin, 17 Watson, 24 Davis, 82 Auclair, 94 Davis