The football nation will watch in Week 16 as the Tampa Bay Buccaneers try to win their fifth straight game and, if the Atlanta Falcons lose on Monday night, clinch a fourth straight division title.
The Buccaneers will play in the Sunday Night Football spotlight on December 22 against the Dallas Cowboys at AT&T Stadium. The game will be televised to a national audience by NBC, with kickoff scheduled for 8:20 p.m. ET. It will be the final road game of the regular season for Tampa Bay.
The Bucs won their fourth straight game in Week 15 with a 40-17 thrashing off the Chargers in Los Angeles. The victory put Tampa Bay up by 1.5 games over the Falcons in the NFC South, pending Atlanta's Week 15 Monday night game at Las Vegas. If Atlanta loses that game, the Buccaneers will be two games up with three weeks to play. That means they would have a chance to clinch the division in Week 16 with a win in Dallas and a Falcons loss at home against the New York Giants.
The Buccaneers will be riding into Dallas on a hot streak, particularly on offense. The Bucs rang up 506 yards of offense in Los Angeles, including 223 on the ground and for the first time in team history have exceeded 150 rushing yards in four straight games. Pending the two Monday night games, the Buccaneers currently rank third in total yards, fourth in points scored, tied for fourth in rushing yards and fifth in passing yards. Baker Mayfield threw four more touchdown passes against the Chargers to give him a career high 32 on the season.
The Cowboys also played well in Week 15, leaving Carolina with a 30-14 win over the Panthers. It was the third win in the last four games for Dallas, which had fallen off the playoff pace with a five-game losing streak prior to that. The Cowboys are without star quarterback Dak Prescott but his replacement, Cooper Rush, threw for three touchdowns and no interceptions against Carolina, while running back Rico Dowdle added 149 yards on the ground. Meanwhile, the Dallas defense intercepted Panthers quarterback Bryce Young twice and sacked him six times, two by perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate Micah Parsons.
The Buccaneers and Cowboys have sparked up an interesting rivalry in recent years, as this will be the fourth time in the last four years they have met, all of them in prime time. Tampa Bay won the last two regular-season contests, including a wild Kickoff Game shootout in 2021, but the Cowboys ended the Buccaneers' playoff run abruptly following the 2022 season. The next nationwide treat between these two franchises will carry serious playoff implications.
