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24 months prior, the Tampa squad suffered a tough loss to the Houston Texans on a final-play TD. During Monday’s matchup, Baker Mayfield and his squad returned the favor with a clutch decisive drive.

Mayfield engineered an 11-play impressive possession that culminated with Rachaad White diving into the pay dirt from two yards with only six seconds remaining. The Bucs came from behind to edge the Texans by a margin of one point. This outcome stood in sharp contrast to the squads’ most recent encounter in NRG Stadium back in 2023, when Stroud found his receiver for a last-second score to seal a 39-37 win.

“We expected a grueling battle, and it’s nice to be on this end this time,” Mayfield said.

Mayfield passed for two hundred fifteen yards and a pair of TDs for the Bucs, who moved to 2-0 on the new campaign. One critical impressive dash on fourth-and-10 kept the final possession intact.

“It was a tremendous job of situational play,” Tampa Bay coach Bowles stated. “Mayfield on the fourth-and-10, using his athleticism to secure the necessary yardage. It ignited the comeback from there.”

During the squad’s opener, Baker threw a late score pass to Emeka Egbuka with 59 seconds to go to earn a twenty-three to twenty victory over the Falcons. He currently matches Doug Williams (1980) as the exclusive Tampa Bay signal-callers to open a year with consecutive late possessions.

The Texans (0-2) seemed to have seized the advantage when they secured a nineteen to fourteen edge on a twenty-five-yard score run by Nick Chubb with two minutes ten seconds to play. The home squad went for the two-point play but CJ Stroud was tackled. The second-year QB passed for two hundred seven yards and a touchdown but struggled to move the unit successfully for much of the second half.

“We missed several occasions to secure that matchup and we came up short on the key plays required to make,” team coach DeMeco Ryans commented.

The home side had registered the initial points of the match when they took an quick lead on Nico Collins’ long touchdown grab. The touchdown was preceded when the QB found with the back for a twenty-seven-yard play on a quick toss the play before. The Buccaneers leveled the game at 7-7 when Mayfield delivered a medium-range touchdown throw to Ryan Miller on their initial drive.

Egbuka grabbed a short score pass with about 10 minutes left in the opening half to put the visitors up fourteen to ten. The first-round pick, a newcomer, joined the latest player since the league merger with three touchdown grabs in his first two contests.

Houston was down by four and failed to found the end zone in the second half when the punter’s boot was blocked by the special teamer and the Houston grabbed the ball on the Tampa Bay 35-yard line with just under seven minutes remaining. The offense could not to move the pigskin and opted for the kicker’s long kick that reduced the margin to fourteen to thirteen with approximately five minutes on the clock.

Houston end the veteran created a loose ball and notched a pair of tackles for loss to bring him to 101.5 in his decade-long NFL tenure.

The Buccaneers are now 2-0 for the consecutive fifth season in succession, the top active streak in the league.