Bucs' Experience Leads to Quicker Bounce-Backs

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers can dig themselves out of trouble a bit easier now than they could before.

Oct 13, 2024; New Orleans, Louisiana, USA; Tampa Bay Buccaneers safety Antoine Winfield Jr. (31) return a fumble for a touchdown against New Orleans Saints wide receiver Chris Olave (12) during he first half at Caesars Superdome. Mandatory Credit: Stephen Lew-Imagn Images / Stephen Lew-Imagn Images

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have found themselves in plenty of holes over the last few years. In the past, those holes have been hard to get out of — take the team's 2023 skid that saw it lose six out of seven games last year, for example.

But now, things look different. The Buccaneers are still facing adversity — a heartbreaking loss to the Atlanta Falcons and a second quarter on Sunday against the Saints that saw them give up 27 points — but the team isn't as slow to adjust this time around. The Bucs pitched a shutout for the remainder of the game on Sunday and ended up winning 51-27.

Tampa Bay running back Bucky Irving wasn't with the Bucs last year. But he does know that the team's veterans have struggled with bouncing back in the past, and now, it's those same veterans who are helping the team avoid those holes going forward.

“I mean, we have great leaders that [have] been down this path that have played this game for a long time so we always lean on [those] guys," Irving said Tuesday. "[Those] guys come to us and say, ‘It’s a long season so don’t get down on yourself.’ We have a lot more football to play and we just have to take it week by week and just keep getting better.”

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One of those great leaders is Antoine Winfield Jr., and the Bucs safety is back in the fold after missing quite a few games to a foot injury. He was a big contributor on Sunday, scooping up a fumble for a touchdown, but he was also there when the team fell behind after a second-quarter collapse.

But they got out of that collapse quick. And for Winfield Jr., that's the standard going forward.

“I would say just from our past experiences of being with each other, we try to get out of those slumps as fast as possible. That’s why I think you can see that day to day but it’s really just the message of, ‘We want to be great,’ right? So every day we have to attack it like that. We can’t let days turn to weeks [when] that slump area happens so we kind of just like nip it in the bud and try to make sure that doesn’t happen to us.”

The Buccaneers will want to keep that momentum going, but they'll have a tough test on Monday when they face off against the Baltimore Rave

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