Packers will face Tampa Bay in NFC title game

The Green Bay Packers will face the Tampa Bay Buccaneers next Sunday at Lambeau Field with a trip to Super Bowl LV on the line.

A day after the Packers advanced with a win over the Los Angeles Rams, the Buccaneers punched their ticket to the NFC title game with a 30-20 win at New Orleans on Sunday night.

It will be the second matchup between the two teams this season and the Packers have to be hoping they’ll put together a better effort. Green Bay jumped out to an early 10-0 lead in the Week 6 game but interceptions on back-to-back drives, including one that was taken back for a touchdown, jump started what turned into a 38-10 rout.

The game was by far the worst performance of the season for quarterback Aaron Rodgers. His two interceptions accounted for 20% of his total for the year and his passer rating of 35.4 was the second-worst of his career in a game he started and finished.

It was a bad day all around for the offense, with Green Bay’s offensive line, a dominant unit for much of the season, giving up five sacks and allowing Rodgers to be hit a season-high 13 times.

On the other side, quarterback Tom Brady threw for 166 yards and two scores, while running back Ronald Jones had 113 yards of Tampa Bay’s 158 on the ground. He also scored twice.

Green Bay is in the title game for a fifth time since Rodgers took over as the starter in 2008. The Packers won the first one in 2010, beating Chicago on the road and going on to win Super Bowl XLV. The other three — 2014, 2016, 2019 — did not end in Green Bay’s favor, including last year’s blowout loss at San Francisco. But this will be the first time in Rodgers’ starting career that the game will be played at Lambeau Field where the Packers are 8-1 this season.

This will be just the second time the Packers and Buccaneers have met in the playoffs. The last meeting came in 1998 with Green Bay winning 21-7 on its way to an appearance in Super Bowl XXXII.

Kick on Sunday is set for 2:05 p.m.