The Bucs were weary. They were behind. Time was running out. They were near the goal.
And then Jameis Winston grinned.
“Who wants a touchdown?” he said to his huddle.
“Me, me, me,” said Mike Evans.
“All right,”” Winston said.
And so it happened. Winston scrambled right, and he threw to a sliding Evans, and the Bucs beat the Atlanta Falcons 23-19 to even their record at 6-6 and remain a contender in the playoff race.
“That’s how it happened,” Winston said. “Other guys said “me,” but Mike was like a little kid. ‘Me, me, me.’ ”
And what if, say, guard Logan Mankins had said “me” loudest of all?
“We would have found a way to get him the ball,” Winston said.
For Winston, it was his second fourth-quarter comeback in a month, and it tripled the team’s victory total of a year ago. It was Winston’s 16th passing touchdown. Earlier in the game, he added his fifth rushing touchdown.
The key play in the game, however, came earlier in the drive. The Bucs faced a third-and-19 from the Atlanta 43 following a holding penalty and a sack. Winston was flushed from the pocket and ran. He was hit 13 yards downfield, and it appeared he was down. But his knee never hit, and Winston escaped from the pile and ran for seven more yards and a first down.
“I’m a ballplayer,” Winston said. “I play quarterback, but I’m a ballplayer.”
The game was one more example of it. Winston threw for only 227 yards, and he ran for only 15. But in the key momets of the game, everyone else was a background player.
“I think he’s a ballplayer,” Bucs’ coach Lovie Smith said. “I think he can throw the ball. Tell me a better running backin in the league right now. I think he fits the profile.”
The win kept the Bucs’ playoff hopes – and doesn’t that sound odd? – alive. Coach Lovie Smith suggested that, for the Bucs, the playoffs have already begun. “We have to win out,” he said.
For the Bucs, the next opportunity comes at home against New Orleans.
