Buccaneers Teased, Pleased, Then the Defense Was Squeezed

Looked like Josh Freeman would do the impossible once again, didn't it?

There he was in his second NFL start, braving the crowd at Land Shark Stadium, braving the Miami defense, leading his Buccaneers from a double-digit deficit to what looked like a spectacular second victory for this young team.

The big guy handed off to Cadillac Williams who wiggled in mid-air and somehow found his way across the goal line and lo-and-behold, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers were leading the Miami Dolphins 23-22 with a little more than a minute to play in their Sunday afternoon battle.

Looked like things were finally going the Bucs' way, eh?

Freeman did his part, Kellen Winslow did his part, Maurice Stovall helped out, Caddy scored, the defense made some stops, made some plays like that Quincy Black interception that set up what looked like the winning series.

And new place kicker Conner Barth did more than his part. He became the first Buccaneer to kick three 50-yard plus field goals (51, 50, 54) in a single game. It was the Birth of Barth.

It was looking good, wasn't it?  Looked like 2-7 was in the bag.

Surely this defense could muster one good final effort. Surely this defense wouldn't let a rookie quarterback march his team down the field for the winning field goal.

But reality struck. This, after all, is the Tampa Bay Buccaneer defense, the Achilles' heel of all that is Pewter.

Reality was a 77-yard drive in that final 1:14 that doomed this hard-playing Buccaneer team.  

Chad Henne passed and Ricky Williams ran the Dolphins close enough for Dan Carpenter to kick his fourth field goal of the day, a 25-yarder with 10 seconds left that provided the 25-23 Dolphins victory that sent these Bucs back to Tampa at 1-8.

"They played hard," coach Raheem Morris said of his team afterward. "Those guys played their hearts out."

Morris beat himself up afterward, blaming himself for getting that unsportsmanlike penalty that led to a Dolphin touchdown before the half.

"At the end of the day, I lost this one at halftime," Morris  lamented. "It's all on me...a discipline issue."

Morris was wrong. He wasn't on the field playing defense in that final minute.

Put this one on them.

They teased us all day, played well enough to keep it close. Played well enough to set up Freeman for another great comeback.

Then, after almost 59 minutes, they didn't play well enough to win it.