After having their bye week to rest up and take some steps toward getting healthier for the second half of the season, the 6-2 Bucs will return to the field on Sunday afternoon, hosting the 7-2 New England Patriots at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa. This is a battle between the NFC and AFC’s current No. 2 seeds, and it’s the start of a tough three-game stretch out of the bye for Todd Bowles and Co.

To this point, the Bucs have gotten off to a hot start to their 50th season, a start that has already matched the best in franchise history. In 1979 and 2002, Tampa Bay turned its 6-2 starts into 7-2 starts. However, in 2020 and 2021, 6-2 turned into 6-3 for Tom Brady and the Bucs. With that said, Sunday is a chance for this team to get to 7-2 for just the third time ever and the first time since its 2002 Super Bowl XXXVII campaign.

It’ll be a tough task for the Bucs, though, as Mike Vrabel has the Patriots off to a phenomenal start to the 2025 season, as they have won six straight games since starting 1-2. New England leads the AFC East and sits behind only Indianapolis in the AFC standings right now, and that’s only due to a tiebreaker. Tampa Bay does have the benefit of coming off a bye and playing this game at home, but the first half of this season really has turned this into more of a marquee game than it originally looked like it would be when the schedule first dropped in May.

Before we dive further in our “What to Watch For” preview later this week, here’s a general preview of Sunday’s “Brady Bowl” between Tampa Bay and New England at Ray Jay:

The Last Time…

The last time these two teams met, it was a special occasion, with Tom Brady returning to Gillette Stadium for the first time as a visitor. After 20 seasons with the Patriots, he left in free agency, became a Buccaneer and led his new team to a victory in Super Bowl LV in his very first season. Then came the 2021 campaign, which featured a big homecoming of sorts for Brady on Sunday Night Football.

Brady was initially met with huge cheers as he jogged onto the field in Foxborough that night before the home fans quickly shifted their attention to rooting for the Patriots. It was a closer game than anticipated, but it was one that Brady and the Bucs would ultimately win by a score of 19-17.

Bucs QB Tom Brady – Photo by: USA Today

Tampa Bay took a 3-0 lead in the first quarter before Mac Jones connected with Hunter Henry for an 11-yard touchdown to give New England a 7-3 lead halfway through the second. Another Ryan Succop field goal got the visitors within 7-6 before halftime, then late in the third quarter, Ronald Jones II ran for an 8-yard touchdown to get the lead back.

The Patriots then responded with an early fourth-quarter touchdown from Jones to Jonnu Smith before the two teams traded field goals, giving New England a 17-16 advantage with under five minutes to go. But when it came down to it, Brady and the Tampa Bay offense did just enough, setting up a 48-yard field goal by Succop for a 19-17 lead with 1:57 to go. New England would have a chance to take a late lead for itself from there, but Nick Folk saw his 56-yard field goal attempt hit the left upright, allowing Bruce Arians’ squad to escape with a victory to get to 3-1 on the year.

Brady didn’t look much like himself in his return to his old stomping grounds, as he completed just 22 of his 43 passes for 269 yards and was held without a touchdown pass. But a 2-0 advantage in the turnover battle helped the Bucs in a big way, with Antoine Winfield Jr. intercepting Jones and Richard Sherman recovering a key fumble.

The Patriots are 7-3 against the Bucs all-time and had a four-game winning streak in the series from 2005-2017 until it was snapped by that 2021 game in Foxborough. On Sunday, Tampa Bay will be looking for its first win over New England in Tampa since 1997, the year before Raymond James Stadium opened and four years before Tom Brady made his NFL debut.

How The Bucs And Patriots Are Trending

The Bucs come into this game having won three of their last four games and six of their first eight to start the season, but it’s fair to say that it doesn’t feel like they’ve played their best football just yet. A huge reason for that has been the inconsistency within their personnel given the rash of injuries they’ve dealt with over the first nine weeks of the season. A group of key starters that includes Tristan Wirfs (3), Cody Mauch (6), Luke Goedeke (7), Mike Evans (4), Chris Godwin Jr. (6), Bucky Irving (4), Calijah Kancey (6), Haason Reddick (1), Jamel Dean (1) and Zyon McCollum (1) has combined to miss 39 games thus far.

That’s not even counting the eight games missed by Jalen McMillan, as well as the eight games lost by both David Walker and J.J. Roberts, who both looked like they could be contributors to the Buccaneers defense this year as rookies. It hasn’t been easy for Tampa Bay over the first half of the season, but there’s a lot to love about the fact that this is a group that still managed to get to 6-2 with a 1.5-game lead in the NFC South in the first half of the season.

Bucs QB Baker Mayfield and OC Josh Grizzard – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

The offense has certainly been hit harder by injuries than the defense, and it has shown in some of the inconsistency the unit has dealt with, especially as of late. Baker Mayfield played at a superb, MVP-like level for the first six games of the season to help the team start 5-1, and even with his Superman-level play, the Bucs only barely survived the Falcons, Texans, Jets and Seahawks. Mayfield has seen rookies Emeka Egbuka and Tez Johnson, as well as veterans Sterling Shepard and Cade Otton step up in the absences of Evans, Godwin and McMillan. But things got ugly for Josh Grizzard‘s offense in the final two games before the bye week.

Tampa Bay’s offense was held to single-digits in a 24-9 loss to Detroit in Week 7, then it scored only 16 points in a 23-3 win over New Orleans the following week, needing a defensive touchdown to get any kind of spark going. The injuries to the right side of the offensive line have begun to catch up with the offense, especially in the run game as the unit ranks just 24th in rushing after a top-five year a season ago. Irving’s injury has been part of that, too, but the lack of a run game has put more pressure on Mayfield’s shoulders.

And in recent weeks, that pressure has seemingly mounted as Mayfield himself has been banged up with a knee injury and it was clear that he couldn’t make some of the scrambling hero plays he was making earlier in the season. He was under constant pressure, too, which led his accuracy to plummet over the last two games. The hope has to be that the bye week gave him a chance to get his knee feeling better. Not only that, but there’s also some hope that he could have right tackle Luke Goedeke back for the first time since Week 2 after his 21-day practice window to come off injured reserve opened earlier this week.

Bucs HC Todd Bowles – Photo by: Cliff Welch/PR

It doesn’t feel like a stretch to say that the Buccaneers defense has oftentimes been the strength of the team this year, which makes sense given the improved depth in the secondary and the outstanding play from the likes of Yaya Diaby, Vita Vea, Antoine Winfield Jr., Jamel Dean, Tykee Smith and rookie Jacob Parrish. A recent increase in takeaways and sacks has been a huge help for Todd Bowles‘ side of the ball, and it’ll take a group effort to keep that going on Sunday and into the second half of the season.

On the New England side, everything has come together quickly in Mike Vrabel‘s first year as the head coach of his old team and the second year of the Drake Maye era. The Patriots have won six games in a row, thanks in large part to spectacular play from Maye and the kind of stingy, disciplined defense you would expect from a Vrabel-coached group.

Maye is looking every bit like the player New England expected him to be when he was drafted No. 3 overall in last year’s draft behind only Chicago’s Caleb Williams and Washington’s Jayden Daniels. Through nine games, he is completing an incredibly efficient 74.1% of his passes for 2,285 yards and 17 touchdowns to just four interceptions. He has added 270 yards and two more scores on the ground, too, giving him over 2,500 total yards and 19 total touchdowns. The Patriots weren’t able to figure out the quarterback position in the first few years after Tom Brady left, but in Maye, they have their guy going forward.

Patriots QB Drake Maye – Photo by: USA Today

Maye has gotten help from plenty of different targets so far this season. Veteran Stefon Diggs leads the way with 45 catches on 53 targets (an astonishing 84.9% catch rate, which trails only Greg Dortch and teammate Mack Hollins as far as catch rate leaders among receivers in the NFL) for 508 yards and two touchdowns. Former LSU star Kayshon Boutte has become a bigger contributor in his third NFL season with 23 catches on 31 targets for 431 yards (18.7 avg.) and a team-high five touchdowns. Tight end Hunter Henry has been a factor, too, with 29 catches on 43 targets for 368 yards (12.7 avg.) and four touchdowns.

It hasn’t just been those three, though. DeMario Douglas, Hollins, Austin Hooper and running backs Rhamondre Stevenson and TreVeyon Henderson all have double-digit catches and more than 130 receiving yards, with Douglas, Hollins, Hooper and Stevenson all averaging more than 10 yards per catch. Maye spreads the ball around, and while the names around him aren’t the biggest, they’ve all been reliable in 2025.

Meanwhile, the New England defense is top-five in points per game allowed, top-10 in total defense and tops in the league in run defense. Linebacker Robert Spillane has 72 tackles (37 solo), with one sack, three tackles for loss, three passes defensed, two interceptions and a forced fumble to lead the way. Harold Landry III and K’Lavon Chaisson have 5.5 sacks each, and three different players — Spillane, Jaylinn Hawkins and Marcus Jones — all have two interceptions each.

Patriots HC Mike Vrabel – Photo by: USA Today

With all of that said, it’s worth mentioning that the Patriots have the NFL’s easiest schedule and have certainly benefitted from that over the first nine weeks. Their résumé includes a season-opening loss to the 2-6 Raiders, while the Dolphins (2-7), Saints (1-8), Titans (1-8), Browns (2-6) and Falcons (3-5) make up five of their seven wins. They do have wins over the 5-4 Panthers and 6-2 Bills, but the 6-2 Bucs will be up their among their toughest (and to an extent, only) tests so far. It’s a measuring stick game of sorts for Vrabel and Co., and they’ll certainly understand that coming into town.

Here’s how the Bucs and Patriots stack up heading into Week 10:

Bucs Offense: 15th in scoring offense (24.6 PPG), 17th in total offense (323.0 yards per game), 13th in passing offense (224.9 yards per game), 24th in rushing offense (98.1 yards per game)

Patriots Offense: 7th in scoring offense (26.3 PPG), 12th in total offense (350.7 yards per game), 9th in passing offense (238.3 yards per game), 17th in rushing offense (112.3 yards per game)

Bucs Defense: T-13th in scoring defense (22.3 points allowed per game), 15th in total defense (321.4 yards allowed per game), 22nd in passing defense (228.8 yards allowed per game), 7th in rushing defense (92.6 yards allowed per game)

Patriots Defense: T-5th in scoring defense (18.8 points allowed per game), 9th in total defense (299.0 yards allowed per game), 19th in passing defense (223.6 yards allowed per game), 1st in rushing defense (75.4 yards allowed per game)

As of Wednesday night, the Bucs are 2.5-point favorites, with the Over/Under set at 48 (per Hard Rock Bet).

Bucs vs. Patriots Game Information

When: Sunday, November 9
Where: Raymond James Stadium (Tampa, FL)
Kickoff: 1:00 p.m. ET
TV: CBS – Jim Nantz (Play by Play), Tony Romo (Analyst), Tracy Wolfson (Reporter)
Bucs Radio: 98Rock – Gene Deckerhoff (Play by Play), Dave Moore (Color), T.J. Rives (Reporter)
Spanish Radio: 96.1 Caliente – Martín Gramática, Santiago Gramática