The Bucs running game took a noticeable dip in 2025, and right guard Cody Mauch knows his season-ending knee injury in Week 2 in a win at Houston didn’t help. Under previous offensive coordinator Liam Coen, Tampa Bay had the league’s fifth-best rushing attack, averaging 146.5 yards per game in 2024, helping the team win 10 games.

The results weren’t nearly as robust last year under Josh Grizzard, Coen’s replacement, as the team’s run game fell to 19th in the NFL, averaging just 114.5 yards per game. Injuries along the offensive line to Mauch and others were certainly a big factor, but Tampa Bay is hoping that new offensive coordinator Zac Robinson can do a better job of marrying the run and the pass together than Grizzard did last year.

Robinson has the same background of working with Sean McVay in Los Angeles as Coen did, as they were on the same Rams staff. After two years as the play-caller in Atlanta, Robinson proved that he knows how to run the ball. The Falcons averaged 130.5 yards per game on the ground in 2024, ranking 10th in the league. Last year, Atlanta ranked seventh with a run game that averaged 125.8.

Mauch, whose roots were in the run-heavy attack at North Dakota State, is thrilled that Robinson is on board as Tampa Bay’s new offensive coordinator.

Bucs OC Zac Robinson – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

“I’m excited for it,” Mauch said on a recent appearance on the Pewter Report Podcast. “I’ve kind of met him in passing at the facility in the cafeteria. He seems like a great guy. The conversations are good and I’m excited to get into some of the stuff he did with Atlanta and how it can add to some of the stuff that we do well.

“Maybe fix some of our – whether it’s mid-zone or outside zone game to complement our gap scheme that we’ve been good at in the past. I’m excited. I think it’s going to be fun.”

Since Dave Canales’ arrival in 2023, the Bucs have excelled at gap blocking in the run game, which is a straight-ahead man blocking scheme that also incorporates “duo” upfront, which is a double-team concept designed to create a power run game along the interior. But the team has struggled to incorporate a zone blocking scheme, which asks the offensive linemen and tight ends to move laterally in concert to create a cutback alley for the running back.

Canales tried some midzone runs, but didn’t have much success with Rachaad White. Coen had more success with a varied approach of gap and zone runs, but the offensive line couldn’t quite master the wide zone scheme he wanted to run.

Bucs head coach Todd Bowles and former OC Liam Coen – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

With backs like Bijan Robinson and Tyler Allgeier in Atlanta, Robinson had a diverse rushing attack that successfully mixed in wide zone concepts with a power gap scheme.

“Yeah, that’s something I’m excited for because as a line – for whatever reason – we’re a good gap scheme team,” Mauch said. “It was good for us. I’m excited because as a line, we’re all athletic enough to get into some more of the wide zone, and whether it’s pin-and-pull or whatever it is. Stuff that made the Falcons offense good these last years.

“I think it’s good to get people moving laterally. The biggest thing about it is, if you’re good at it, it helps set up more of the stuff (gap scheme) that we’re good at. Being less predictable and just giving defenders different ways to feel the blocks that are coming – it all plays a part. So I’m excited to see how we can get after it.”

Cody Mauch, Bucs Are Excited To Play In Zac Robinson’s Wide Zone Scheme

It was difficult for Cody Mauch to watch the Bucs offense struggle to run the ball last year as the team’s record collapsed from a 5-1 start to a 3-8 finish. While rehabbing his knee after a torn meniscus in Week 2, Mauch felt helpless watching the offensive line, which featured replacement guards like Mike Jordan and Dan Feeney, struggle at times.

“I think it was just the case of we were never fully on the same page,” Mauch said. “The O-line, the tight ends – everyone on offense – it all never meshed up perfectly. If four guys have a good block, but one guy whiffs then the play is dead. Or it was the five linemen blocking well and it was the receiver or a tight end not blocking well. We were never all having a good play on the same play.

“That’s what sucks. It takes one guy to kill a play. That’s probably what it was. I feel like that’s a lot of what it is in the NFL when things aren’t going well. It’s one guy getting beat or not having the best rep.”

Bucs OC Zac Robinson – Photo by: IMAGN Images – Mark J. Rebilas

With Mauch cleared to participate in the OTAs this spring, Tampa Bay’s starting offensive line should start the year fully intact. On his recent appearance on the Pewter Report Podcast, Mauch shared his enthusiasm about working with new offensive coordinator Zac Robinson.

“Guys are juiced up about it,” Mauch said. “Nothing really changed too much from year to year on offense, at least from the verbiage. The verbiage is all staying the same. Different coordinators come in and they take a different spin on doing more of this and doing more of that. With Zac, we’re going to get back to doing some of the things we were doing well [in 2024], but also what he’s going to bring in as well.

“It’s like we talked about earlier, if we can get our outside zone game going that’s going to be so beneficial for us. Like last year, if the defense knows we are running then we’re going to run gap scheme. If they know it’s coming, they can just sit in there and you’re not going [to move them], it’s just so hard.”

Having a more diversified running attack that features the offense successfully running gap and wide zone will greatly aid Tampa Bay’s ground game and hopefully propel the rushing attack back into a top 5 unit in 2026 on Robinson’s watch.

“I think when you have confidence that the offense can do whatever [it wants] we can be successful with all of these things,” Mauch said. “Then it’s so much more unpredictable. So yeah, we’re all juiced up for Zac.  We’re going to get back to where we were in 2024 – and then some.”

Watch the entire Cody Mauch interview from Monday’s Pewter Report Podcast by clicking here.