Buccaneers Beat Falcons 16–0 Without Completing a Pass

TAMPA, Fla. — Baker Mayfield threw three passes on Sunday. He completed none of them. He also fumbled three times and recovered all three himself, which tells you everything about the afternoon: the Tampa Bay Buccaneers won 16–0 anyway, and they did it in a way the NFL had not seen in 52 years — on the ground, in the rain, behind a defense that caught more of Atlanta’s passes than Tampa Bay’s receivers caught of their own quarterback’s.

Playing in a driving rain at Raymond James Stadium, on a field the Falcons’ own beat writers described as a slip-and-slide, the Buccaneers (3–5) ran the ball 56 times for a franchise-record 324 yards, smashing the old mark of 283. Bucky Irving carried 27 times for a career-high 170 yards, his long run a 46-yarder, and scored the game’s only touchdown on a 4-yard run with 3:47 left in the third quarter, capping a 90-yard drive. Kenny Gainwell added a career-high 140 yards on 25 carries. Two backs over 100 in the same game: the Buccaneers had not done that in 28 years, since the Mike Alstott and Warrick Dunn days. Chase McLaughlin handled the rest of the scoring with field goals of 46, 34 and 42 yards, and he is now a perfect 19-for-19 on the season.

The scoring, such as it was, all came off McLaughlin’s foot for three quarters. His 46- and 34-yard field goals built the early lead, and after Parrish’s interception gave Tampa Bay the ball back, the offense drove 65 yards for his 42-yarder and a 9–0 halftime edge. It could have been worse for Atlanta, and early on it nearly was: cornerback Mike Hughes saved a touchdown at the end of Tampa Bay’s first drive with a pass breakup in the end zone, the one moment all afternoon the Falcons’ defense bent without breaking.

But the record books were already open. The last team to win an NFL game without completing a pass was Buffalo on September 29, 1974, when Joe Ferguson went 0-for-2 and the Bills beat the Jets 16–12. Until Sunday, that was the only such game of the Super Bowl era — and Tampa Bay’s version came with a flourish Buffalo’s never had: a shutout. The 1974 Bills at least conceded 12 points. Mayfield, in his second game back after missing three weeks with a fractured thumb, never had to test the thumb more than three times, and the Buccaneers’ coaching staff deserves its share of the oddity: on a day when throwing was a rumor, they simply declined to participate in the passing game at all, handing the ball off 56 times and daring Atlanta to be the team that beat itself. Atlanta obliged, four interceptions over.

Atlanta (3–5) never found the game at all. Michael Penix Jr. put together the worst line of his young career: 8 of 24 for 125 yards, no touchdowns and four interceptions, three of them before halftime. Alex Anzalone picked him off twice in the first quarter. Jacob Parrish intercepted a fourth-down throw at Tampa Bay’s 17, and the Buccaneers drove 65 yards the other way for McLaughlin’s 42-yarder. Zyon McCollum got the fourth interception at the Tampa Bay 14. Atlanta finished 0-for-12 on third down, Nick Folk missed his only field-goal attempt from 53 yards, and when Penix finally uncorked a 76-yard strike to Jahan Dotson inside the final four and a half minutes, the drive died on downs at the edge of the red zone. Bijan Robinson, the back Tampa Bay spent the week worrying about, was held to 76 yards on 19 carries and did not catch a single pass.

The strangest part, on reflection, is how sustainable Tampa Bay made it look. The defense that came in with the league’s No. 2 pass defense never recorded a sack — Atlanta’s pass rush managed the same zero, with a single quarterback hit — because neither team could plant a foot long enough to do anything elaborate. Penix’s passer rating for the afternoon was 12.0, a number that barely exists at this level. Atlanta’s punter, Jake Bailey, may have been its most productive offensive player, with 193 yards on four punts. Irving, meanwhile, quietly turned the day into a season statement: he arrived with 558 rushing yards and left with 728, second-guessing nobody about who the Buccaneers’ offense runs through when the weather turns.

The milestones stacked up quietly around the strange one. It was Tampa Bay’s first shutout since January 7, 2024, and its first home shutout since December 5, 2004 — also against Atlanta. It was the Buccaneers’ second straight win and their first at home all season after an 0–4 start at Raymond James, and it pulls them within a half-game of Carolina atop an NFC South that does not have a single team above .500. Irving’s lost fumble was Tampa Bay’s only turnover. Atlanta has now lost three of four, and heads home with a quarterback question it did not expect to be asking this loudly. Every stat from this one is in the Game Center.