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Bucs at Falcons: Distractions

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By ROY CUMMINGS

Published: November 18, 2007

ATLANTA - They say they have moved on. Nearly four months after their rookie head coach implored them to do that, after he suggested their survival depended on it, it seems they have.

The Atlanta Falcons, derailed before the season even began by the Michael Vick saga as well as injuries to starters such as running back Warrick Dunn and defensive tackle Rod Coleman, are on the march.

They have won two in a row. It's a modest winning streak, even more modest when you consider it started with a victory over San Francisco at home and came on the heels of their second three-game losing streak.

Still, in the middling NFC South, even a modest two-game winning streak can make you a title contender. That's what the Falcons are now. At 3-6, they're back in the hunt, which brings us to today.

Scary game. That's how one member of the Bucs organization defined today's encounter with the Falcons in the Georgia Dome. Look at the standings and you understand why.

The NFC South is the only division in which the top team (Tampa Bay) is separated from the bottom team (Atlanta) by two games. Scary game, indeed.

"Yeah, we're in first place," Bucs running back Earnest Graham said. "But that can turn around in a hurry. So we have to find a way to come off that last victory of ours and keep running with it."

That last win was two weeks ago, against Arizona. The Bucs spent last week resting and nursing key players - their biggest distraction this season - back to health. Some believe it will give them an edge. Others aren't so sure.

The bye week can slow a team's momentum, they say, rob it of its rhythm, leave it a little stale. Bucs coach Jon Gruden worried about that early last week. He had reason to worry. Since bye weeks were adopted, teams coming off byes have won only a few more games than they've lost.

Pit one of those teams against a team on a roll, against a team with a renewed sense of confidence, against a team that's finally starting to feel it a little bit, and you've got Bucs-Falcons.

It's not the game most Bucs followers expected. Shoot, it's not the game most NFL followers expected. Most factored in the loss of Vick and wrote the Falcons off weeks ago. In the past two weeks, the Falcons have written themselves back in.

Their winning streak has done for them what rocket fuel does for the space shuttle. It has propelled them into another realm. Bucs quarterback Jeff Garcia knows the feeling.

He was the fuel behind a second-half surge by last year's Eagles, who won their final five games to capture the NFC East. He's still riding that rocket launch today. It's why this game concerns him.

"It's big," Garcia said of what a minor surge can do for a previously struggling team such as the Falcons. "It creates an energy, an excitement that you didn't have before. It gets you over that hump.

"At this time of the year, certain teams start to fade because they're feeling worn down. They're feeling like they don't have a chance. They're feeling like the energy has left them."

The Jets and Dolphins feel that way. So do the Raiders and Vikings.

Not the Falcons.

Step inside their locker room and you get the feeling they suddenly believe anything is possible, even with all the distractions.

"We definitely have a chance to make things interesting in the end," quarterback Joey Harrington said. "By playing Tampa, we have a chance to jump right back into it this week."

Harrington has had a hand in the Falcons' resurgence. Though he could be replaced by Byron Leftwich today, he has kept turnovers to a minimum and, last week, threw a last-minute touchdown pass to win at Carolina.

Dunn has had a hand in the resurgence, too. Healthy now after recovering from preseason back surgery, the former Buc ran for 100 yards in the first of the Falcons' two recent victories, and produced 140 all-purpose yards last week at Carolina.

Most believe the resurgence is primarily because of the Falcons' defense. In the past two weeks, the Falcons have forced six turnovers, allowed an average of 243 yards and allowed opponents to convert six of 29 third downs.

"The reason they've been in games, the reason they've won games, is their defense," Bucs receiver Ike Hilliard said. "It's going to be a challenge to move the ball on them."

The biggest challenge, Gruden said, will be in throwing on them. The Falcons have two superb pass rushers in John Abraham and Coleman (healthy as well now) and a seal-proof secondary.

"They're all over the opponents I've seen them play," Gruden said. "Pressure, full pressure. They've got a lot of really good players and they're playing hard."

They've been doing that since the beginning. The difference now, Harrington said, is the Falcons are making plays on both sides of the ball and getting some breaks.

"We've been playing good ball," he said. "We just weren't making plays at critical times. That's what we've done the last couple weeks. We've started making plays."

First-year Atlanta coach Bobby Petrino, formerly of Louisville, always knew his team would. He said the Falcons just needed time to adjust to the adversity they were dealt during the early going and to find a rhythm.

"It wasn't easy to start training camp off, no question about it," Petrino said. "The relationships everyone had with Michael, some of them were six years long. But our guys, our players and coaches have worked at it hard.

"The distractions, we've worked our way through those. We've had good leadership in the locker room and, with the exception of the Giants game a 31-10 loss, we've been in every game we've played in the fourth quarter. Now, there's an opportunity sitting out there for us. We just have to take care of our business.

"So it is a big weekend for us. It's a big weekend for everybody."

Reporter Roy Cummings can be reached at (813) 259-7979 or rcummings@tampatrib.com.

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