Between Tom Brady, Mike Evans, Chris Godwin, Anthony Nelson, Sean Murphy-Bunting and Devin White, the Bucs had plenty of big contributors in Sunday’s 30-24, division-clinching win over the Panthers.

But one of Tampa Bay’s biggest saviors on the day was rookie punter Jake Camarda. The play he made in the final minute saved the Bucs from a very nervy situation, as they were up just six points.

Set to punt the ball away with 42 seconds to go, Camarda scooped up a bad snap, sprinted to his left while avoiding Carolina’s rush and got a desperation punt off. That desperation punt rolled inside the Panthers’ 5-yard line.

The punt ultimately didn’t count, as the Bucs were flagged for an ineligible downfield kick. That meant a re-kick, which the rookie sent to the Panthers’ 8-yard line. But had Camarda fallen on the loose ball or been tackled, the Panthers would’ve taken over near midfield needing a touchdown and an extra point to win and spoil the Bucs’ party.

Not only that, but the play also took more time off the clock. By the time Carolina took over at its 8-yard line after the re-kick, there were 26 seconds to go. The Bucs held on from there, improved to 8-8 and won the NFC South.

“I have never seen a punter make an athletic play like that,” head coach Todd Bowles said after the game. “No, I really haven’t. He did a heck of a job doing that.”

Instincts Helped Camarda Potentially Save Bucs’ Season

Bucs TE Cade Otton and P Jake Camarda – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

Football moves quickly, and as the Bucs’ rookie punter made that play, it almost looked like he had done it before. That’s not the case, Bowles said Monday.

“That was all instinct on his part,” Bowles said. “We don’t practice botching a punt. It happens, but you don’t practice botching a punt, especially running to the sideline and making a kick like he did. Very instinctive of him to do that. It was a heck of a play.”

Coming out of the University of Georgia, Camarda has wowed with his athleticism before. He ran a 4.56-second 40-yard dash at the NFL Scouting Combine last spring and put that speed on display against the Panthers.

“Pretty much what was going through my head was [to] find a way to, I guess, get to some open field,” Camarda said Monday. “A lot was happening, and I can’t say that I was thinking a ton. It was kind of just based more on – I guess instinct as you would say – and just, kind of running a little bit to the left, found a little bit of an opening, and I knew I wasn’t going to get a first-down, so I just thought, ‘I’m going to try and get a little bit of a foot on this and see what we can do.'”

As much as Camarda’s play may have saved the game late, he didn’t want to take too much credit when asked about the magnitude of his play.

“Yeah, you know, I look at it like this: you can look at it that way. You can say that, but no one play is really going to change everything like that in my book,” Camarda said. “It’s a team game, it’s a team effort and – just look at the game for example. Look at what Tom [Brady] and Mike [Evans] did, right? We’re not going to win that game without those guys, you know what I’m saying?

“So, I feel like, yeah, some people have certainly said some of those things about me, but we don’t win this game if it wasn’t for everyone else’s effort on that field. So, I definitely don’t want to take that credit.”