Saints RB Mark Ingram apologizes for 'crucial mistake' in Monday night loss
The New Orleans Saints fourth quarter performance was a parade of errors on Monday night, turning a 16-3 lead into a crushing 17-16 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers that devastated their slim divisional chances.
Running back Mark Ingram was one of the players that messed up during that collapse, and he took to social media after the game to apologize for his crucial mistake.
Ingram's mistake was one of the first mistakes the Saints made over the final seven minutes of the fourth quarter.
Facing a second down and eight situation, Ingram caught a short pass and seemed to have an opportunity to get a key first down that would have moved the sticks and probably helped the Saints eat at least another two minutes off of the clock. That would have almost certainly been enough to help secure the win and prevent Tom Brady's two touchdown drives in the closing minutes.
Instead, Ingram stepped out of bounds a yard short of the sticks, which was followed by the Saints not picking up the first down on third-and-short. They punted the ball back to Brady, who promptly engineered a 91-yard touchdown drive (the Buccaneers' longest scoring drive of the season) to climb back to within six points.
As costly as Ingram's mistake was, the Saints still had plenty of opportunities to make up for it and still win.
It was their next offensive possession that really accelerated the meltdown when they went three-and-out, lost seven yards, and only took 34 seconds off the clock due to quarterback Andy Dalton taking a second-down sack and Taysom Hill not being able to haul in what would have been a huge third-and-17 conversion on the next play.
Veteran leadership by Ingram to take responsibility and apologize, but he was not the only person on the New Orleans sidelines that messed up that stretch. The team also had plenty of opportunity to hold on to a two-touchdown lead in the final six minutes of regulation, even after his mistake.
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