Buccaneers 24, Cowboys 16 Recap: Bucky Irving Runs for 165 as Tampa Bay Stuns Dallas on Thursday Night Football

NFL Week 5 | Thursday, October 8, 2026 | AT&T Stadium, Arlington | box score

A Thursday Night Off During Football Season

Do you know how rare it is to get a Thursday night off during football season?

If you're a diehard football fan, you already know the answer. It doesn't happen. Thursday is football. Sunday is football. Monday is football. And if there's a game on Tuesday, Wednesday or Friday, chances are you're watching that too. Your family knows the routine. Your girlfriend knows the routine. Once the season starts, a big piece of your spare time belongs to the NFL.

So when I looked at this week's Thursday night game and saw the Cowboys hosting the Buccaneers, I did the math on what a rare free Thursday could be worth.

What do you do with a night like that? You see your family. You give your girlfriend a little attention. You do something productive instead of watching football and pretending you're not watching football while you check scores on your phone.

Your Pick Is In. It's a Lock. You Don't Even Have to Watch.

Here's why I felt so good about it. Tampa Bay hadn't won a game all season. They were 0-4, with four straight one-score losses (Cincinnati, Cleveland, Minnesota, Green Bay). Baker Mayfield was out with a thumb injury, so an undrafted rookie, Jalon Daniels, was making his second career start on a short week. Dallas was the obvious survivor pick.

My pick was in. The lock was locked. This was about as close to a guaranteed win as the NFL ever gets, which meant I didn't even have to watch the massacre.

So I did what any responsible adult would do with a rare night off. I went to Home Depot.

I've been meaning to get a leaf blower. The leaves aren't going to clean themselves up, and what better time to shop than while the Cowboys handle a winless team? I grabbed a cart. I started with a battery-powered model. Then I figured, why not an extra battery? And a garage shelf, while I'm here. I was practically spending the money before kickoff.

Kickoff was 8:15 p.m. ET. I said it out loud, right there in the aisle, to nobody: "Thanks for the gift in advance, Dak."

What could possibly go wrong?

Wait, WTF Is Happening?

The phone buzzes. Javonte Williams runs it in from the 1-yard line and Dallas scores first. Perfect. That's how a lock is supposed to start. I toss the extra battery in the cart.

Another buzz. Tampa Bay answered with a 73-yard drive that ate 10 minutes and 58 seconds, the longest drive by time for the Bucs since 2007, and Bucky Irving caught a 5-yard touchdown from Jalon Daniels to tie it. Okay. Relax. Teams score.

Halftime. Dallas 10, Tampa Bay 7 on a 41-yard Brandon Aubrey field goal. I'm fine. I'm looking at a second battery and a rake. The Cowboys are winning. Everything is under control.

Then the second half starts and my phone turns into a slot machine that only pays out for the other guy.

Buzz. Bucky Irving breaks off a 72-yard run to open the half. Buzz. Emeka Egbuka finishes the drive with a 14-yard end-around touchdown, 14-10 Tampa Bay. I check the score twice. I look at the garage shelf. I put it in the cart anyway, because panic shopping is still shopping.

Buzz. Yaya Diaby intercepts Dak Prescott. "Thanks for the gift, Dak." I said it out loud again, and this time a guy in an orange apron gave me a look.

Buzz. A 64-yard catch-and-run from Tez Johnson sets up Irving's 1-yard touchdown, 21-10. Buzz. Chase McLaughlin adds a 41-yard field goal and it's 24-10. That's three straight Tampa Bay scores and 17 unanswered points in the third quarter. Tampa outgained Dallas 197 yards to 59 in that stretch.

Now I'm staring at the score, staring at the leaf blower and wondering whether somebody at the NFL made a terrible mistake. But I'm not overreacting. It's Dallas. Surely they'll remember they're playing the winless team.

Fourth quarter. Todd Bowles goes for it on fourth-and-goal from the 1 and Sean Tucker gets stopped. I breathe. Dallas goes 99 yards, George Pickens makes an 18-yard touchdown catch, and the two-point try fails. 24-16. One score. I've got a chance. I add a rake to the cart to celebrate.

Dallas gets it back and drives to the Tampa Bay 24 with a chance to tie. Dak Prescott throws to Jake Ferguson, it bounces off his hands, and Alex Anzalone picks it off with 1:16 to play. I'm standing in line at the register when the final alert hits.

Tampa Bay 24. Dallas 16. Final.

Excuse me?

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers, who hadn't won a game all season, just beat the Dallas Cowboys. My survivor pick is dead. And I'm standing in Home Depot with a cart full of stuff I only bought because I believed Dallas would win.

The Game Stats: How Do You Lose This One at Home?

The full box score has every player line. Here is the team side:

StatisticTampa BayDallasFinal score2416Total yards419366Rushing yards24150Passing yards189316First downs2420Turnovers03Penalties14 for 927 for 57Time of possession39:2120:39

Dallas threw for 316 yards. George Pickens had nine catches for 130 yards and a touchdown, and Dak Prescott completed 24 of 42. So no, this wasn't a team that couldn't move the football. It was a team finding creative ways to sabotage itself: two Prescott interceptions, a fumble on a KaVontae Turpin kick return that Miles Killebrew forced and Kevin Knowles recovered, and a run defense that gave up 241 yards.

Tampa Bay ran 39 times at 6.2 yards a carry, held the ball for nearly 19 more minutes than Dallas and took it away three times. The Bucs had 14 penalties and still won. They defended 10 passes. The Cowboys had 50 rushing yards. Fifty. That's not a running game. That's a game plan left in the parking lot.

Bucky Irving ran 21 times for 165 yards, a career high, at 7.9 yards a carry, with a rushing touchdown and a receiving touchdown. His 72-yard run opened the second half and is the second-longest carry in the NFL this season. It was the first two-touchdown game of his career.

Jalon Daniels didn't have to be a superstar. He went 19 of 25 for 189 yards and a touchdown with no interceptions, ran for 23 yards, and became only the second undrafted quarterback to start and beat Dallas, after Ed Rubbert in 1987. Jacob Parrish and Zyon McCollum played well in coverage, and Baker Mayfield lost all three of his starts to open the year. His backup has one win in two.

CeeDee Lamb had one catch for 4 yards at halftime on four targets and left the game with a quadriceps injury, four days after he caught 17 passes in Houston. Javonte Williams scored his seventh touchdown of the year but gained only 45 yards on 12 carries. Check the injury report and the player news before you set anything this week.

Scoring, Drive by Drive

First quarter: Javonte Williams 1-yard run. Dallas 7, Tampa Bay 0.

Second quarter: Jalon Daniels to Bucky Irving for 5 yards to finish a 73-yard drive, 7-7. Brandon Aubrey 41-yard field goal with 26 seconds left, Dallas 10, Tampa Bay 7.

Third quarter: Emeka Egbuka 14-yard run, 14-10. Bucky Irving 1-yard run, 21-10. McLaughlin 41-yard field goal, 24-10. A 61-yard McLaughlin attempt was nullified by a delay of game penalty.

Fourth quarter: George Pickens 18-yard catch from Dak Prescott, two-point try fails, 24-16. Alex Anzalone interception with 1:16 left.

The Survivor Pool Funeral

If you picked Dallas, I feel your pain. The Buccaneers improved to 1-4. The Cowboys fell to 2-3, their third loss in five games, after losses to the Giants and the Ravens and wins over Washington and Houston. You weren't trying to be clever. You looked at a winless team and a Dallas team expected to win and made the obvious call. Survivor pools are about getting through the week, and Dallas couldn't even do that.

Next time, start with the NFL verdicts and the spots board, then check team streaks, the against-the-spread records and the line check before you lock in a safe pick.

Fantasy and DFS Takeaways

Bucky Irving is a must-start every week, and his volume is real. Check the volume board and the defense vs. RB page. Emeka Egbuka and Tez Johnson are the Tampa Bay receivers to watch on the start/sit board, and Jalon Daniels's legs give him a floor. On the Dallas side, George Pickens stays a target magnet, CeeDee Lamb depends on the quad, and the red zone page shows where the touchdowns are coming from. Build with NFL DFS, the lineup shuffler and projections.

What Comes Next

Neither team plays on Oct. 11. Buccaneers host Steelers on Oct. 18 and visit Panthers on Oct. 25. Cowboys go to Packers on Oct. 18. See the Week 6 slate and the full NFL schedule, then build your slips with the AI parlay builder, NFL parlay and NFL props pages.

The Real Cost of a Night Off

Here's the part nobody tells you about a rare free Thursday. I wasn't knocked out of my survivor pool at home. I was knocked out in the garden department, with a cart full of things I didn't need and money I didn't have yet, because I'd already spent the win before Dallas earned it.

A leaf blower. An extra battery. A second battery, because I panicked. A garage shelf. A rake. Every one of those purchases was backed by the same sentence: "The Cowboys have this."

Losing the survivor pool cost me one pick. Home Depot cost me a lot more than that. And I've got the receipt to prove which one hurt worse.

So I have to ask. I can't be the only one who took this free Thursday, filled the cart and watched a lock turn into a bill. Somewhere out there, somebody else bought a grill, a patio set or a snow blower they didn't need, all because Dallas was playing the winless team. If that's you, you have my sympathy.

Thanks for the gift, Dak. The leaf blower better work.

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