Zyon McCollum got brutally honest about Bucs blowing a 17-point lead to Saints

For the most part, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers had a ton of fun on Sunday afternoon in New Orleans. It's hard to be upset when a rival gets blown out 51-27, and most of the week has been spent celebrating the job Liam Coen's offense did in cooking the Saints defense like it was cajun gumbo.

It's important not to forget one major detail from Sunday's game, though.

Before Tampa Bay pulled away like a getaway car at a bank heist, the Bucs were on the verge of a total collapse. After jumping out to a 17-0 lead, Tampa Bay couldn't get out of its own way and ended up going into halftime trailing by more than a field goal.

The Bucs played one of the worst seven minutes of football we've seen in a while, and it remains deeply concerning, given the team's upcoming stretch of games. The Ravens, Chiefs, and 49ers likely won't let Tampa Bay back in like the Saints did, which Zyon McCollum hinted at when explaining what ultimately led to that blown lead.

Zyon McCollum explains what led to Buccaneers blowing 17-point lead to Saints

Over the course of seven minutes, the Bucs allowed 20 unanswered points, committed five mind-numbingly stupid penalties, and had breakdowns at all three phases. The offense gave up a pair of interceptions, the defense bled the lead, and special teams allowed a punt return for a touchdown.

All of this came after a gorgeous opening drive touchdown, an Antoine Winfield fumble return for a touchdown, and what appeared to be lockdown defense on a rookie quarterback.

The general consensus coming out of Week 6 is that the Bucs put the league on notice and set themselves up to confirm their contender status over the next four weeks. If that's going to happen, McCollum points to what went wrong during the seven minutes in hell and what can be learned from it.

“We just need to learn to not get as comfortable,” McCollum said, via JoeBucsFan. “I mean, I think that we just thought, ‘Like oh, we got this in the bag’ and like, you know, ‘Nothing can stop us.’ And when you kind of have that mindset, the game will kind of humble you a little bit. So I think it was really important, though, for us to get back into a close game like that and then to be able to re-focus and re-compose ourselves and to go out there and finish it the way that we did. That’s going to be a good win for us.”

What was more miraculous than the 27 points the Bucs hung on the Saints in the second half was how good they looked doing it. We've seen Tampa Bay fall through that sort of trap door before, but this is the first time they've found a way to climb back out.

That's why the victory is so satisfying. After giving up 27 points in a quarter, the Bucs' defense didn't allow a single point the rest of the game; Todd Bowles and his staff made masterful halftime adjustments.

Actions speak louder than locker room talk, and the Bucs can prove they learned a lesson by not repeating the same frustrating mistakes. There is almost no margin for error with the upcoming slate of games, as Super Bowl contenders -- which the Saints very clearly are not -- won't be so forgiving if the Bucs play as sloppy as they during that second quarter on Sunday.

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