Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield looked himself in the mirror following Sunday’s 28-23 loss to the Patriots before pointing his ire toward a disappointing effort on both sides of the football. Nearly half of New England’s 435 total yards came on three explosive touchdown plays while the Buccaneers struggled to sustain momentum after opening the game on a 65-yard scoring drive.

“You have to have some pride about you,” Mayfield said. “You’ve got to have the fear of that failure of messing up for your teammates. When we talk about something, you’ve got to have that responsibility and accountability for the guys around you and get it fixed. In tight ball games like this when you play a good team like the Patriots, little things will get you beat.”

Mayfield took accountability for Tampa Bay’s third loss of the season. While the Buccaneers played mistake-free, three possessions in the fourth quarter resulted in no points and little yardage prior to a seven-play, 65-yard scoring march in the final 90 seconds.

Mayfield finished 28-of-43 for 273 yards and three touchdowns, but the Buccaneers had four three-and-outs and converted only five of 13 third-down opportunities.

“Like I said, lack of execution,” Mayfield said. “There is a certain point — we are a good team, but to be great, when you score on the opening drive, you know what it looks like, you set the tone, you’re not satisfied with it. You come back and in your head, it’s 0-0 and you go do it again. 

“Right now, I think we are lacking that on offense and it comes down to me — that is my job to get that fixed and I will do that.”

Bucs enter pivotal stretch

Sitting atop the NFC South at 6-3 overall ahead of the Carolina Panthers (5-5), the Buccaneers play the Buffalo Bills and Los Angeles Rams on the road over the next two weeks, with those teams combining for 13 wins up to this point.

Buffalo suffered a letdown Sunday in Miami while the Rams handled the San Francisco 49ers behind four touchdown passes from Matthew Stafford. Tampa Bay averaged just 18.3 points per game over its last three contests since erupting for a 27.5 points per game average the first six weeks of the season.

“Offensively, I’m hoping our guys do get pissed off about this,” Mayfield said. “This isn’t the end of our season. I know that. We still have very important games ahead of us. Games like this, when you don’t win them, it should sting. It should really, really hurt.”