Saints better hope the Buccaneers don’t get a chance to run the score up in the future
Things didn’t go well for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers in their season-opening game against NFC South rival New Orleans Saints.
The Buccaneers fell 34-23 at the hands of the Saints and it wasn’t enough to suffer the loss. Instead, New Orleans wanted to run their noses in it.
After a game full of small scuffles and trash talk, the Saints elected to run a trick play with the game firmly in hand.
They were up 34-23 late in the fourth quarter and that’s when we saw Drew Brees throw a backwards pass to Taysom Hill, who chucked it long to RB Alvin Kamara, resulting in a 38-yard completion down to the Bucs’ 9-yard line. Eventually, Tampa Bay held and the score remained 34-23, but make no mistake about it: The Saints were trying as hard as they could to put another touchdown on the board before it was all said and done.
If that weren’t enough, Saints DE Cameron Jordan took a shot at the Tampa Bay Buccaneers fan base following the game. Jordan was asked about playing in a stadium with no fans in attendance and he responded:
"“It felt like we were at a Tampa Bay game,” Jordan said via Bleacher Report."
Buccaneers are going to improve and Saints better hope that it’s simply still not good enough
If you think this Tampa Bay team isn’t going to learn from their mistakes and come back stronger as a result, you’re sadly mistaken.
Bruce Arians was asked if he still thought the Buccaneers could win the NFC South division this season and his reply was short, sweet and to the point:
"‘Hell yeah,’ Arians said."
The Buccaneers know they made too many mistakes to win the game, but that doesn’t mean the result will be the same next time.
Rivalries are always going to have some extra mustard behind them and we shouldn’t expect the Saints to show sportsmanship there at the end of the game or even in the post game, but the only thing I’ll say to that is this: They better hope the Buccaneers don’t get a chance to return the favor.
If I’m the Bucs, I’m already circling that game against New Orleans in early November.
I’m focusing in on doing the things needed to get to the point where that game truly matters and then heading into it looking to make it as humiliating as humanly possible for the Saints the next time we meet again.