2024 NFL Season, Week 5: What We Learned from Falcons' win over Buccaneers on Thursday night

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• READ: Kirk Cousins throws franchise record 509 yards in OT win
• RE-WATCH: Buccaneers-Falcons on NFL+

1. Cousins throws for 509 yards, leads thrilling comeback. For those wondering when the Falcons’ offense would show its true potential, the answer was Thursday. Kirk Cousins was tremendous in the win, overcoming a late interception to throw for a career-high 509 yards and lead the Falcons to a massive overtime victory. Things looked dire when Cousins forced a pass into double coverage for a pick with 1:52 left in the game, trailing, 30-27. Atlanta had only a 5% chance to win the game at that point, per Next Gen Stats. But the defense got a stop, and a penalty knocked the Bucs out of field-goal range. Cousins led them down on a game-tying field goal drive, which his teammates didn’t exactly make easy for him. But the overtime was just as crisp as the opening drive of the game, slicing through the Bucs’ secondary. It didn’t even matter that Drake London was injured in overtime; his replacement, KhaDarel Hodge, caught a 45-yard walk-off TD to win it the very next play. In spite of stepping on some landmines along the way, the Falcons’ offense took off Thursday -- and Cousins was the key to making it happen.
2. Mayfield has strong game, but offensive mistakes cost them late. Cousins’ counterpart, Baker Mayfield, was no slouch at all. After a bit of a rough outing in Week 3, Mayfield appeared to be back in full force with a strong outing Sunday and a three-TD first half on Thursday. He looked to be in total command of the offense (minus an early dropped pick), and when things slowed down after a scorching first half, Mayfield picked up some key first downs late with his legs, even after taking a hard sack at the end of the third quarter. But Tampa could only muster six second-half points, and Bucky Irving coughed the ball up late on what was shaping up to be a game-sealing drive. A missed facemask call against Irving also hurt the Bucs. That left the door open for the Falcons to tie it in regulation -- and then win it in OT. On a night when the Bucs defense had its hands full, the offense couldn’t finish the game off.
3. Falcons spread wealth on offense. The Falcons were by no means perfect on offense Thursday, hurting themselves with penalties in the positive end of the field and a big dropped pass by Darnell Mooney. The run game also wasn’t its typically productive self. But they were prolific throwing the football all game. Get Kyle Pitts involved more? Check. He had seven big catches for 88 yards. Mooney’s drop midway through the fourth quarter hurt, but he had two TD catches. London was a monster all game, too, with 12 catches for 154 yards and a touchdown. London’s 14-yard catch in the final seconds of regulation set up Younghoe Koo’s game-tying field goal and his grabs of 6 and 18 yards in overtime led to Hodge’s game-winner. Thursday night was a snapshot of the Falcons’ offense at their most prolific. Just imagine what they can do without the self-inflicted mistakes.
4. Bucs’ shorthanded defense runs into a buzz-saw. Even with a quick turnaround for a road game, it’s hard to square the circle of what we’ve seen from the Buccaneers’ defense the past two games. On Sunday, this unit sacked Jalen Hurts six times and held the Eagles to 227 yards. On Thursday night, Kirk Cousins had 253 passing yards at halftime. The Falcons rang up 550 yards, even with the Bucs playing good run defense all night, outside of one 28-yard Bijan Robinson run. The secondary was picked apart, and the middle of the field was wide open most of the night. The Bucs were always going to be up against it without Antoine Winfield Jr. playing for a third straight game, and Jordan Whitehead was hurt Thursday, leaving Tampa Bay without its two starting safeties. Tykee Smith was up against it all game in the slot, missing a tackle on Darnell Mooney’s second TD. Zyon McCollum made some good plays but also allowed two TDs, per Next Gen Stats. But it wasn’t just the secondary. Lavonte David intercepted Cousins late on what could have been a game-clincher, but he struggled in coverage all game. So too did K.J. Britt, who also was flagged for a bad unnecessary roughness penalty. This was just a different unit than the one we saw four days ago.
5. Big win for Raheem Morris, Falcons, but mistakes almost cost them. Facing the Buccaneers for the first time as a head coach, Morris certainly had to enjoy Thursday’s victory against the team he used to coach years ago. It was also a massive win for his team, which was on the verge of going 1-3 at home and 2-3 overall if not for the late comeback. The Falcons made all kinds of special teams errors, from two Koo field-goal misses, with one blocked in the fourth quarter; allowing kick returns of 53 and 39 yards; and a delay of game before Koo’s make to push it to overtime. On defense, A.J. Terrell dropped a pick on the first drive, leading to a Bucs TD. The secondary had no answers for Mike Evans early, looking collectively lost a few times. Antonio Hamilton gave up two TD passes and was lucky he didn’t give the Bucs a first down early in the third quarter, hitting Mayfield just as he stepped out of bounds. Then there were the offensive penalties, with six of them coming in Bucs territory. There’s no need to dampen a dramatic victory excessively, but the Falcons and Morris have to know they were fortunate to get out alive Thursday night.

Next Gen Stats Insight for Buccaneers-Falcons (via NFL Pro): Falcons WR KhaDarel Hodge reached a top speed of 19.70 mph on his game-winning touchdown reception in overtime against the Buccaneers, his second-fastest speed as a ball carrier in his career. Hodge was expected to gain only 0.4 yards after the catch but generated +39.6 YAC over expected on his way to the end zone. Hodge’s touchdown was the sixth-most improbable touchdown reception of the season (0.03% probability).

NFL Research: Falcons QB Kirk Cousins became the 13th player in NFL history with 500 or more passing yards and four or more TD passes in a single game.