In 2021, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers won seven of their last eight games and scored an average of 33 points in those wins. The one loss in that span, a 9-0 blanking by the 6-7 New Orleans Saints at Raymond James Stadium in Week 15. That was one of the five victories the Saints have logged in their last seven trips to Tampa. It’s safe to say the 2025 Buccaneers are well aware that they can’t take any New Orleans team lightly, even one that is coming in with a 2-10 record.

The Buccaneers have won their last three games against New Orleans, however, and Head Coach Todd Bowles knows the formula for getting a second consecutive season sweep: Take the ball away on defense. Don’t turn it over on offense.

“Any time we play them, it’s always who wins the turnover battle – every time,” said Bowles. “The records are out the window. They play hard, we play hard, we both know each other pretty well. Whoever wins the turnover battle wins the game.”

The Buccaneers prevailed 23-3 in Week Eight in the Superdome when they won the turnover battle 4-1, including a game-tilting pick-six by outside linebacker Anthony Nelson. The Saints’ only points came on a 15-yard drive after a Baker Mayfield fumble late in the first half. Tampa Bay intercepted both New Orleans quarterbacks, Spencer Rattler and Tyler Shough, after the Saints made the switch to their rookie at halftime. The second-round draft pick has started every game since and has thrown for 1,068 yards, five touchdowns and four interceptions while completing 65.2% of his passes.

“He’s faster than I thought,” said Bowles of the Saints’ new starter under center. “He plays with a lot of confidence, has a very quick release, very accurate. He’s a hell of a competitor.”

Shough has understandably made a habit of getting the ball to fourth-year wideout Chris Olave, who ranks second among all NFL wide receivers to Cincinnati’s Ja’Marr Chase with 111 targets. He has turned those targets into 73 catches for 781 yards and five touchdowns. Tight end Juwan Johnson has also been an effective weapon in the passing attack with 54 grabs for 576 yards and three touchdowns. Young pass-catcher Devaughn Vele, acquired in a preseason trade with Denver, has begun to emerge as a strong second option in the wake of the team’s trade of Rashid Shaheed to Seattle. Vele had a career-best game in the Saints’ narrow loss in Miami last weekend, catching eight passes for 93 yards and a score.

Meanwhile, the Saints’ veteran-laden defense, which held the Bucs to 212 yards and 14 touchdowns n the Week Eight meeting, continues to hold its own. Ageless linebacker Demario Davis is fifth in the league with 111 tackles and the edge rush trio of Cameron Jordan, Chase Young and Carl Granderson has combined for 16 sacks. The Saints’ defense ranks 12th in the NFL in yards allowed, seventh in passing yards allowed and eighth in sacks per pass play.

“[They have] some minor changes here and there,” said Mayfield of the Saints’ defense since the last time he faced it. “They still do what they do and do it well. I’d say the pass rush is getting home a little bit more. They’re trusting Demario in coverage, letting some of the other linebackers blitz. [Davis] is still a matchup nightmare when he lines up [on] the line of scrimmage. [We have] to be aware of where he’s at, but I think Granderson and Chase are also playing really well on the edges.”

The Buccaneers are not looking past the Saints – Mayfield declined to speak about upcoming matchups with the Carolina Panthers on Wednesday – which means they are concerned only with this Sunday’s game not the various playoff scenarios. And yet it is true that Tampa Bay can clinch the division title if it can win its next three games against the Saints, Falcons and Panthers. Conversely, a loss on Sunday to New Orleans would drop them into a virtual tie with the Panthers and would almost certainly mean the division would be coming down to a Week 18 game against Carolina.

“You want to control your own destiny. You don’t want to sit and look at scores every Sunday,” said Bowles. “If you can control your own destiny and get guys back in the process and acclimate them the right way and they can help contribute, that’s all you can ask for.”

The Saints, of course, will be just as eager to play spoiler against a bitter rival.

“Against them, it really never [comes easy],” said Mayfield. “We don’t like them; they don’t like us. They play hard, you can see it on the tape based on the other games that they’ve played since we’ve played them last and it shows. We know what to expect; record doesn’t indicate how physical this matchup is going to be, what a tough matchup it is. They know us, we know them well, so it’s one of those, who can execute better and be the more physical team?”

GAME AND BROADCAST DETAILS

New Orleans Saints (2-10) at Tampa Bay Buccaneers (7-5)

Sunday, December 7, 1:00 p.m. ET

Raymond James Stadium (capacity: 65,844)

TV Broadcast Team: Kevin Harlan (play-by-play), Trent Green (analyst), Melanie Collins (reporter)

Radio: 98Rock (WXTB, 97.9 FM), Flagship Station

Radio Broadcast Team: Gene Deckerhoff (play-by-play), Dave Moore (analyst), T.J. Rives (reporter)

Spanish Radio: 96.1 Caliente

Spanish Radio Broadcast Team: Carlos Bohorquez (play-by-play), Martin Gramática (analyst), Santiago Gramática (reporter)

GAMEDAY INFORMATION

Coming to the game or enjoying pregame festivities? Check out our Buccaneers Gameday Page for everything you need to know about getting ready for the game, Tailgate Packages, Bucs Beach and more!

TICKETING INFORMATION

The 2025 season is underway and there are a limited number of Single Game Tickets on sale now! Visit Buccaneers.com to purchase tickets.

ALL-TIME HEAD-TO-HEAD SERIES

The Buccaneers and Saints were frequent opponents in the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s when the NFL’s annual game schedule was heavily influenced by the previous year’s standings. They became even better acquainted when the league changed its scheduling format to a divisional rotation in 2002, after a 32nd team was added and the NFL realigned into eight four-team divisions. The Buccaneers left their old NFC Central haunt that year to join the new NFC South, which also drew in the Saints, Panthers and Falcons. That meant two games against the Saints every year, of course.

New Orleans leads the all-time series with Tampa Bay, 40-27 but the Buccaneers have won six of the last seven meetings, including a Week Eight contest in the Superdome earlier this year. Anthony Nelson broke up a scoreless affair in the second quarter with an incredible interception in which he leaped to tip the ball, hauling in the rebound and running over quarterback Spencer Rattle for a three-yard pick six. Sean Tucker added a one-yard touchdown run and Chase McLaughlin earned NFC Special Teams Player of the Week honors for drilling three field goals of 52 yards or longer. The Saints made a switch at quarterback at halftime, replacing Rattler with rookie Tyler Shough but the Bucs limited the home team to a single field goal in a 23-3 decision.

The Bucs also won both games with the Saints in 2024. The first of those was a 51-27 blowout in the Superdome in Week Six of this season. The Buccaneers rushed out to a quick 17-0 lead in the first quarter, keyed by Antoine Winfield Jr.’s 58-yard fumble return for a touchdown, but a rash of turnovers by the offense in the second quarter allowed the Saints to storm back for a 27-24 halftime lead. However, the Bucs scored all 27 of the game’s second-half points while amassing a franchise single-game record with 594 yards of offense. Tucker won NFC Offensive Player of the Week honors for his 192 yards from scrimmage and two touchdowns in the game.

In the final week of the 2024 regular season, the Saints came to Raymond James Stadium with the Bucs needing a win to clinch a fourth straight NFC South title and rushed out to a 16-6 halftime lead over the home team. However, Baker Mayfield threw second-half touchdown passes to Payne Durham and Jalen McMillan and Bucky Irving iced the 27-19 decision with an 11-yard touchdown run in the final two minutes. The Buccaneers’ defense famously got one more defensive stop to prevent a game-tying touchdown and two-point conversion and give the ball back to the offense so Mike Evans could catch one more nine-yard pass and surpass 1,000 receiving yards for the 11th season in a row.

The Bucs also won in New Orleans in 2023, taking a 26-9 decision in the Superdome in Week Four. Mayfield threw touchdown passes to Deven Thompkins, Trey Palmer and Cade Otton and the Bucs’ defense held the Saints to 197 total yards of offense. Winfield had another big game, combining a team-high nine tackles with a sack, two tackles for loss, a pass defensed, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery.

The Buccaneers won five of their last six regular season games in 2023, but the exception was a rematch with the Saints in Tampa in Week 17. New Orleans got the split and kept the Bucs from clinching the division title (for one more week), racing out to a 20-0 lead before finishing off a 23-13 victory. Quarterback Derek Carr threw touchdown passes to tight ends Juwan Johnson and Taysom Hill and the Saints’ defense picked Mayfield off twice.

The Buccaneers own the win in the only postseason meeting between the two teams, as they defeated the Saints in the Divisional Round in 2020 by a 30-20 score in the Superdome on the way to the Super Bowl LV championship. That proved to be the final game in Drew Brees’s illustrious career, as he retired a few months later. Sean Murphy-Bunting, Mike Edwards and Devin White all picked Brees off as the Bucs rallied from a seven-point deficit in the second half to get the win, scoring the game’s final 17 points.

In 2022, the Bucs got their first season sweep of their division rival since 2007. Before that, the Saints had won seven in a row in the head-to-head battle (not counting the 2020 postseason game) dating back to 2018. Tampa Bay won in the Superdome in Week Two in 2022, taking a 20-10 decision that was actually still a 3-3 tie going into the fourth quarter. The Bucs’ defense generated five turnovers in the last 17 minutes of game play, including a pick-six by safety Mike Edwards. In the Week 13 rematch in Tampa, on the Monday Night Football stage, the Bucs rallied for two fourth-quarter touchdowns to eke out a 17-16 victory. Tom Brady led 91 and 63-yard touchdown drives in the last five minutes of the game, ending the first with a one-yard touchdown pass to Otton and the second with a six-yard scoring connection with Rachaad White with three seconds left in the game.

During their long winning streak in the series, New Orleans scored at least 28 points in five of those seven games, including a 36-27 decision in New Orleans on Halloween last year. The exception was a 9-0 blanking the Saints delivered at Raymond James Stadium last December, marking just the second shutout for either team in the series and the first since a 41-0 win by New Orleans in 2012. The roughest game for the Buccaneers in that stretch came on a Sunday night in November of 2020 at Raymond James Stadium, with the Saints rolling to a 38-3 decision that was easily Tampa Bay’s worst game on its way to that Super Bowl title.

The Bucs-Saints series was first contested in 1977. That initial meeting is famously the first win in franchise history for the Buccaneers, who left New Orleans on December 11 of that year with a 33-14 victory that snapped a franchise-opening 26-game losing streak. The Bucs still had a 3-2 edge in the series by the end of 1982, which would also prove to be the end of the franchise’s first run of playoff seasons. The Saints took control of the series by winning six straight in the mid-’80s.

Since they became division mates, the Bucs and Saints have squared off 45 times, 27 of them going in favor of New Orleans. The two teams had a run of season splits from 2015-18, and it wasn’t just a matter of the each club holding serve on home field advantage. The Buccaneers actually won at New Orleans in 2015 and 2018, as noted above. That 2018 game was a 48-40 decision that set an NFL record for most combined points in a Week One contest.

Weirdly, the Saints beat Tampa Bay twice in that first NFC South season in 2002, even though the Buccaneers would win the 2002 division title on their way to victory in Super Bowl XXXVII. Those two games represented half of the Bucs’ losses that year. In a minor bit of payback, a 2-12 Bucs team beat a 13-1 Saints team in the penultimate week of the 2009 season, before the Saints would go on to win their first Super Bowl. The Saints also won both games in 2020 in the regular season, in another Buccaneers championship campaign.