Baker Mayfield on Monday threw for 337 yards and three touchdowns as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ defense never allowed Jalen Hurts and the Philadelphia Eagles’ sputtering offense to get into a rhythm in a 32-9 win in front of a crowd of 63,397 at Raymond James Stadium in Florida.
All Mayfield and the resurgent Bucs wanted was an opportunity to make some noise in the playoffs. A strong finish to the regular season provided one and their wild-card playoff victory over defending National Football Conference champions the Eagles guaranteed that they have another.
The Bucs (10-8) won for the sixth time in seven games to advance to a NFC divisional round matchup on the road on Sunday against the Detroit Lions (13-5), another team — like the Eagles — who stymied Mayfield during the regular season.
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“We worked extremely hard to get a chance to be in the playoffs and we just wanted an opportunity,” Mayfield said. “Our guys came out and played really, really well... Once again, the defense played lights out. We’re happy, but we’ve still got more to go.”
“We were underdogs, we’re going to be underdogs next week, too,” Tampa Bay coach Todd Bowles said. “We understand that. We embrace it. We like it.”
David Moore scored on a 44-yard reception in the first quarter. Rookie Trey Palmer broke the game open with a 56-yard catch-and-run for a TD that put the Bucs up 25-9 late in the third quarter. Both receivers took advantage of a porous, poor-tackling Eagles secondary to make their way to the end zone.
Mayfield, the 2018 No. 1 overall draft pick who is playing with his fourth team in less than two years, completed 22 of 36 passes without an interception. He capped his first playoff appearance since the 2020 season with a 23-yard TD pass to Chris Godwin.
“We were a little out of sync. That starts with me,” Eagles coach Nick Sirianni said. “I wasn’t good enough. I didn’t put them in good enough positions.”
Mayfield said the communication by the Bucs’ offense throughout the week made things feel comfortable during the game.
“Everybody was on the same page, knowing what we were going to do offensively, schematically,” Mayfield said. “Came out and attacked. Obviously, got to make a few more plays overall on offense, but we made more than enough to win tonight.”
In Orchard Park, New York, Josh Allen threw three touchdown passes and scored on a franchise playoff-record 52-yard touchdown run as the Buffalo Bills beat the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-17 in their American Football Conference wild-card playoff game that was postponed a day because of a lake-effect blizzard.
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