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Panthers look to facing Bucs for NFC South title<\/p>\n
USAT’s Joe Rivera and Chris Bumbaca dive into Tampa Bay\u2019s ugly skid and Carolina\u2019s momentum.<\/p>\n
Sports Seriously<\/p>\n
The Tampa Bay Buccaneers<\/a> have struggled significantly during the second half of the 2025 NFL season and enter Week 18 of the 2025 NFL season with a 7-9 record as a result.<\/p>\n Despite that, the Buccaneers still have a chance to win the NFC South.<\/p>\n How can that happen? The Buccaneers will need to beat the Carolina Panthers<\/a> in their head-to-head matchup and get help from the New Orleans Saints<\/a> in their game against the Atlanta Falcons. Such a result would grant Tampa Bay its fifth consecutive division title and set it up for a playoff battle with one of the NFC’s top wild-card teams.<\/p>\n That may not be the path Baker Mayfield<\/a> and Co. envisioned needing to take after a strong 6-2 start to the season, but nonetheless, Tampa Bay has a chance to make it into the playoffs for a sixth straight season.<\/p>\n Who will the Buccaneers play in the playoffs if they are able to earn the NFC’s final playoff berth? Below is a breakdown of the team’s playoff scenarios and potential wild-card opponents.<\/p>\n Who will Buccaneers play in playoffs?<\/p>\n The Buccaneers can only be the No. 4 seed if they are able to make it into the playoffs. That guarantees they will play the NFC’s No. 5 seed, which is set to be the second-place finisher in the NFC West race.<\/p>\n With that in mind, Tampa Bay will play one of the following teams if it wins the NFC South:<\/p>\n Buccaneers playoff scenarios<\/p>\n First things first, the Buccaneers have to make it into the postseason race. The following must occur for Tampa Bay to win the NFC South title in NFL Week 18:<\/p>\n Buccaneers win vs. Panthers ANDFalcons lose or tie against Saints<\/p>\n If that happens, they will be the No. 4 seed and will either face the 49ers, Seahawks or Rams in the wild-card round. Below is a look at how each matchup could occur:<\/p>\n San Francisco 49ers49ers lose vs. Seahawks AND Rams lose or tie vs. Cardinals<\/a> OR49ers tie vs. SeahawksSeattle SeahawksLos Angeles Rams49ers lose vs. Seahawks AND Rams win vs. CardinalsNFL playoff schedule<\/p>\n The NFL playoffs will kick off on Jan. 10 with the league’s first two wild-card matchups before concluding on Feb. 8 with Super Bowl 60 at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara.<\/p>\n Wild card weekend<\/p>\n All times Eastern<\/p>\n Saturday, Jan. 10<\/p>\n AFC\/NFC wild card game: 4:30 p.m.AFC\/NFC wild card game: 8 p.m.<\/p>\n Sunday, Jan. 11<\/p>\n AFC\/NFC wild card game: 1 p.m.AFC\/NFC wild card game: 4:30 p.m.AFC\/NFC wild card game: 8:15 p.m.<\/p>\n Monday, Jan. 12<\/p>\n AFC\/NFC wild card game: 8:15 p.m.Divisional round<\/p>\n Saturday, Jan. 17<\/p>\n AFC\/NFC divisional game: 4:30 p.m.AFC\/NFC division game: 8:15 p.m.<\/p>\n Sunday, Jan. 18<\/p>\n AFC\/NFC divisional game: 3 p.m.AFC\/NFC divisional game: 6:30 p.m.NFL conference championship round<\/p>\n Sunday, Jan. 25<\/p>\n AFC championship game: 3 p.m.NFC championship game: 6:30 p.m.Super Bowl 60Date: Feb. 8, 2026Location: Levi’s Stadium (Santa Clara, California)Time: 6:30 p.m.TV: NBCNFL playoff picture Week 18AFCDenver Broncos (13-3, AFC West winners)*New England Patriots (13-3, AFC East winners)*Jacksonville Jaguars (12-4, AFC South leaders)*Pittsburgh Steelers (9-7, AFC North leaders)Houston Texans (11-5, wild card No. 1)*Los Angeles Chargers (11-5, wild card No. 2)*Buffalo Bills<\/a> (11-5, wild card No. 3)*<\/p>\n In the hunt: Baltimore Ravens (8-8)<\/p>\n NFCSeattle Seahawks (13-3, NFC West leaders)*Chicago Bears<\/a> (11-5, NFC North winners)*Philadelphia Eagles (11-5, NFC East winners)*Carolina Panthers (8-8, NFC South leaders)San Francisco 49ers (12-4, wild card No. 1)*Los Angeles Rams (11-5, wild card No. 2)*Green Bay Packers<\/a> (9-6-1, wild card No. 3)*<\/p>\n In the hunt: Tampa Bay Buccaneers (7-9)<\/p>\n An asterisk (*) denotes teams that have clinched a playoff spot. Teams that have clinched division titles are noted accordingly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Panthers look to facing Bucs for NFC South title USAT’s Joe Rivera and Chris Bumbaca dive into Tampa…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":650564,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2077],"tags":[115,1466,247,265,825,240,375,390,210,374,215,211,214,53,1327,235,260,692,391,324,860,7,27,345,20842,239,58,248,826,267,246,206,55,88,854,873,6,35196,84,676,245,264,428,236,359,424,397,818,238,237,261,327,817,829,9,266,819,209,704,250,2597,2596,776],"class_list":["post-650563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa-bay-buccaneers","tag-afc","tag-afc-south","tag-american","tag-american-football","tag-american-football-conference","tag-angeles","tag-arizona","tag-arizona-cardinals","tag-bay","tag-bears","tag-bills","tag-buccaneers","tag-buffalo","tag-buffalo-bills","tag-cardinals","tag-carolina","tag-carolina-panthers","tag-chicago","tag-chicago-bears","tag-conference","tag-east","tag-football","tag-green","tag-green-bay-packers","tag-hub","tag-los","tag-los-angeles-rams","tag-national","tag-national-football-conference","tag-national-sports","tag-neutral","tag-new","tag-new-orleans-saints","tag-news","tag-nfc","tag-nfc-east","tag-nfl","tag-nfl-hub","tag-nfl-playoffs","tag-orleans","tag-overall","tag-overall-neutral","tag-packers","tag-panthers","tag-playoffs","tag-rams","tag-saints","tag-scores","tag-seahawks","tag-seattle","tag-seattle-seahawks","tag-south","tag-sport","tag-sport-scores-u0026-statistics","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-statistics","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-bay","tag-tampa-bay-buccaneers","tag-tampabay","tag-tampabaybuccaneers","tag-u0026"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650563\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/650564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}