“Yeah, look, it sucks. It stings. It hurts.” That's what New Orleans Saints coach Dennis Allen had to say after the Saints blew a 13 point fourth quarter lead to lose 17-16 to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Mike Detillier, WWL NFL analyst and co-host of Sports Talk agreed.
“Finding a new way to lose, that's what bad teams do,” Detillier told WWL's Tommy Tucker. “Losing's got a million fathers. You can point back to numerous times in the game.”
And there were a litany of things to point to. Dropped passes from players like Chris Olave and Jarvis Landry. Penalties like 12 men on the field. Running out of bounds short of the first down line.
“You had them, and you let them off the hook,” Detillier said. “You gave one more bullet in the chamber to a guy who's done this numerous times. It goes right back to what we've spoken about the last few weeks. Bad teams find a way to lose games, and that's what you've got right now.”
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The Saints looked to have things under control in the second half. The defense recovered a fumble, and the offense followed up with a grinding 12 play drive that took 7:20 off the clock and ended with a field goal. The defense forced a punt on the ensuing drive, and the offense put together another 12 play drive that took 6:51 off the clock and ended with field goal to give New Orleans a 16-3 lead with 8:02 left in the game. The defense then forced a punt again, giving the Saints the ball back with 6:54 left.
According to ESPN, the Saints had a win probability of over 98% at this point.
Instead of sealing the win and putting the Saints right back in the thick of the division race, the Saints sputtered. The offense had two straight three and outs while the defense gave up two straight touchdowns. And the Bucs won it.
The Saints now head into their bye week with this crushing loss, almost, but not quite, mathematically eliminated from the playoffs. They'll host the Atlanta Falcons on December 18.