The Tampa Bay Buccaneers suffered a brutal 36-30 overtime loss to the Atlanta Falcons at Mercedes-Benz Stadium to open Week 5, and Baker Mayfield knows where the game was lost.
While the offense managing to put up 30 points on the road in a division game is nothing to turn your nose up at, Mayfield knows that the unit should be doing far better.
Getting the ball late in the fourth quarter, and with a chance to run out the clock and score a field goal at worst, rookie running back Bucky Irving fumbled and gave the Falcons life. But a Lavonte David interception on the next Falcons drive gave the momentum back to the Bucs offense. However, a quick three-and-out followed, and Atlanta managed to score a last-second field goal to get to overtime.
For Mayfield, who was 19 for 24, 180 yards and three touchdowns, the offense let themselves down by not finishing drives.
"All I care about is wins, that's it," Mayfield said. "So got to find a way to finish that game out on offense, I'm thinking about the first half, missing that shot to Shep [Sterling Shepard] should have been a touchdown, ended up with three points. I'm just replaying that one over in my head that maybe shouldn't have even been an overtime situation. So have to make the plays when they're there and then in the second half, just got to take care of the football and then got to finish on offense."
The Buccaneers were efficient against the Falcons, with the offense not having a drive longer than 5:04, yet still scoring touchdowns on three of their first four drives.
But as Mayfield alluded to, when the chance was there to drive the stake through the Falcons' heart, they missed their chance, and Kirk Cousins led a superb comeback.
When the tape is reviewed, the Buccaneers will know that they had ample opportunities to win the game but failed.
Which will make the overtime loss even harder to stomach.
