You could hear a pin drop in the soon-to-be-shuttered Veterans Stadium. The same was definitely not true in living rooms all across the Tampa Bay area.
The greatest single moment in the first 50 years of Tampa Bay Buccaneers football has been determined by fan voting in a thoroughly entertaining 64-entry tournament, and the winner is no great surprise. Rondé Barber's 92-yard pick-six that sealed the Buccaneers' win in the 2002 NFC Championship Game, sending the NFL's 27th franchise to its very first Super Bowl, has long been considered the team's signature moment. Now Buccaneer fans have made it official.
After five previous rounds of voting, Barber's pick-six that "shut down the Vet" went head-to-head with the Buccaneers' historic achievement of being the first team ever to play in (let alone win) a Super Bowl in its own home stadium. As significant as that latter achievement was, nothing could top the indelible mental highlight reel of Barber sprinting past the deflated Philadelphi Eagles' bench and then into the end zone, his left thumb hooked over his shoulder to point at his jersey's name plate. Tensions had grown for Buccaneer fans as star quarterback Donovan McNabb had threatened to mount a comeback in the fourth quarter on that January 19, 2003 evening, but Barber erased all of them in an instant, and the parties started back in Tampa.
It was a moment of profound relief and vindication for a team that had been chasing greatness for years. Standing in the way, season after season, had been the Philadelphia Eagles and their raucous stadium. The Bucs had Super Bowl aspirations after taking the 1999 NFC Championship Game down to the wire, but their efforts in both 2000 and 2001 flamed out in lopsided fashion in Wild Card games at Veterans Stadium. Even in 2002, as the Buccaneers were putting together their best season ever to that point and completely smothering opponents with their legendary defense, another trip to Philadelphia ended in the team's only loss in a 10-week span. For those reasons, the Buccaneers were decided underdogs as they came back to the Vet in late January.
And, sure enough, things didn't start well for the visitors. Brian Mitchell returned the opening kickoff 70 yards and Duce Staley scored on a 20-yard run just 45 seconds into regulation to put the Bucs in a quick 7-0 hole. However, a long field goal by Martin Gramatica, a stunning 71-yard catch-and-run by a grieving Joe Jurevicius and a signature one-yard touchdown run by Mike Alstott gave the Bucs their first lead before the first quarter was over.
Barber and the Bucs' defense took over from there. Before his biggest moment even came to life, Barber was all over the field, racking up three tackles, a sack, a forced fumble and three other passes defensed. McNabb was held in check for most of the game and the Eagles' run game did little after that first Staley touchdown. Another Gramatica field goal and a Keyshawn Johnson touchdown catch had the Bucs up 20-10 with a little over a quarter to play.
That was still the score when Philadelphia got the ball back with 6:31 to play and McNabb started making Houdini escape plays and pushing the ball downfield. A 14-yard catch by Antonio Freeman made it first-and-10 at Tampa Bay's 10-yard line and the ghosts had haunted the Buccaneers at Veterans Stadium started whispering. A touchdown here and a quick stop by the Eagles' defense and McNabb and company would have plenty of time to pull off one last scoring drive to send the Bucs home again.
Instead, Barber made six steps, in just the right order with just the right timing.
Originally lined up in the left flat as the Eagles came to the line of scrimmage, Barber took two steps toward the line of scrimmage, feigning the exact same blitz that had freed him up for a sack and a forced fumble earlier in the game. McNabb took the bait, and when he looked away, Barber backpedaled two steps to his original spot, thinking McNabb would take the hot read and throw a quick curl to Antonio Freeman in the flat. Barber was right, and as McNabb released the ball he took two more steps to cut in front of Freeman, snagging the ball with outstretched hands and never breaking stride. No Eagles player laid a hand on him as he loped 92 yards to history.
A week later, Derrick Brooks would get his own clinching pick-six in Super Bowl XXXVII, a play broadcast legend Gene Deckerhoff described as the "dagger." Dwight Smith also became the first, and still only, player with two interception return touchdowns in the same Super Bowl on that evening. In the decades that have followed, other Buccaneer greats have added their inspirational moments and achievements to the memory banks of every Buccaneers fan, right up to the very last play of the 2024 regular season, when Mike Evans got the catch he needed to extend his history-making 1,000-yard streak.
The boat parade trophy toss. Tom Brady choosing Tampa Bay in free agency. That first franchise win in New Orleans. Maybe some day another Buccaneer will create a moment that will challenge Rondé Barber's pick-six against the Eagles for the hearts and minds of the team's fan base. For now, however, Barber has shut down the competition the same way he shut down the Vet 22 years ago.
