NFL Week 14 winners and losers: Tom Brady is still setting records. Packers continue to own the Bears.

The Week 14 slate Sunday started slowly, with blowouts and games that many expected to have drama falling flat. But a couple of overtime finishes brought the week back to life.

And in the process, the Buccaneers — one of the teams who won in that afternoon window — are reverting back to their Super Bowl form, even if their defense may be taking a slight step backward. Their success is in large part because of the continued and unparalleled success of Tom Brady.

Elsewhere in the NFC, the Cowboys had some self-inflicted mistakes late in their game against NFC East rival, the Washington Football Team, but Dallas prevailed and now has a comfortable lead in the division. Which means Washington will have to grind just to stay in the wild-card race.

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Here are the Week 14 winners and losers.

WINNERS

Tom Brady: Still setting records

The Buccaneers got a little conservative in the second half. Absent of their lone scoring possession after intermission — an 11-play drive that went 84 yards and resulted in a field goal — Tampa gained only 26 yards in the third and fourth quarters. Still, the Bucs won in a thrilling 33-27 victory against the Bills. And, despite the dismay of so many fans tired of Tom Brady, he's still doing it an elite level and is setting standards that are difficult to fathom.

Brady broke the NFL all-time record for completions, surpassing Drew Brees. His game-winning score, a 58-yard catch and run to Breshad Perriman, was his 700th career touchdown pass, including the playoffs. It's hard to see anybody else coming close to challenging this mark in the future and Brady, at 44, may be the front-runner for the NFL MVP. He leads the league in passing yards (4,134) and passing touchdowns (36). More importantly, he has led the Buccaneers to four straight victories and within striking distance of the NFC's No. 1 seed.

Jimmy Garoppolo

We've been critical of Garoppolo, the quarterback of the 49ers, here in the past. But we need to praise him now because he was the catalyst that helped the 49ers weather a Bengals comeback attempt in a 26-23 overtime victory, in particular with his play late in the game.

In San Francisco's game-winning drive in overtime, Garoppolo completed all six of his attempts for 78 yards, including the 12-yard score to Brandon Aiyuk. But, really, it shouldn't have even gotten to that. Garoppolo had previously led another efficient drive just before the end of regulation, but Niners place kicker Robbie Gould missed the 47-yard attempt as time expired. On that series, Garoppolo went four-of-nine for 50 yards, including a perfectly placed, 19-yard strike to tight end George Kittle that helped set up the field goal attempt.

For Garoppolo, it's about consistency. He rarely makes the crucial mistake, but he struggles at pushing the ball downfield and can sometimes suffer lapses in accuracy. Still, there's a valuable spot for efficient passers who can manage games. With rookie Trey Lance waiting for his time, even if it comes next season, games like these can show any potential future teams that Garoppolo can still win games in the clutch.

Bye-week Colts

No team had a better week without playing than the Indianapolis Colts (7-6). While they were able to enjoy their bye on the last week that they were taking place across the league, they also got a boost from the teams that had been above them in the AFC playoff picture.

First of all, it's invaluable to get the bye this late in the season. As the season wanes and games become all the more important, getting the chance to rest this close to the playoffs is a boon. But because the Steelers (6-6-1), Bengals (7-6) and Bills (7-6) all lost, Indianapolis actually jumped up three spots in the AFC standings from where it had been entering the week. Now, Indy is in the No. 6 seed and holds a valuable head-to-head tiebreaker over the team in the No. 7 slot, the Bills, because the Colts won the Week 11 matchup between both teams. The next two weeks, however, will be telling. Because even with the good news for the Colts in Week 14, they will likely need to steal at least one of the next two games, which come against the Patriots (9-4) and Cardinals (10-2), both of which are the top seeds in their conferences.

Recovering Packers (still) own the Bears

Let's first get this out of the way: In its 45-30 victory against the Bears, the Green Bay defense gave up far too many explosive plays in the high-scoring second quarter. But once the unit settled down and held Chicago to just a field goal in the second half, it showed just how dangerous this Packers team can be, especially now that they're getting healthy.

The emergence of cornerback Rasul Douglas, who returned an interception for a touchdown for the second game in a row, is a particular break for the Packers. Douglas, who has emerged only because of a shoulder injury to star Jaire Alexander, will give the secondary much more depth once Alexander (who returned to practice Wednesday) is able to go. And All-Pro left tackle David Bakhtiari (knee) is also being eased back gradually. The Packers, who already look like one of the two best teams in the NFC will only get better once those key starters return. As for Aaron Rodgers? After his "I still own you" comments to Bears fans in a Week 6 victory, he — again — showed out: 29-of-37 passing for 341 yards with four touchdowns and no interceptions and a 141.1 QB rating.

LOSERS

Urban Meyer

The experiment in Jacksonville is going from bad to much worse. Coach Urban Meyer is increasingly showing that his style was never suited to the NFL, despite any success he may have enjoyed in college. And, after an NFL Network report emerged on Saturday about dysfunction within the coaching staff and locker room, Meyer, again, is having to answer questions about off-field incidents. It has gotten so bad that a 20-0 shutout loss against the Titans to drop the Jaguars to 2-11 has become almost secondary.

Meyer spent a great deal of his postgame press conference talking about anonymous leaks to the media and vowed to fire any assistant who was caught doing so. He said he was "demanding" of his coaches, but he repeatedly fails to take accountability tor the team's failures. He specifically came out of retirement to coach rookie quarterback Trevor Lawrence; Lawrence has only one touchdown pass since Week 9, spanning 196 passing attempts. He threw four picks against Tennessee. There have been very few positives to come from Meyer's time with the Jaguars; he hasn't shown to be capable of game management, game planning, of building chemistry or culture. If this pattern continues, he may not have much time left.

Matt Rhule

Another long-time college coach struggling to find his footing in the NFL, Rhule's second season as the coach of the Panthers is prompting doubt about whether he can sustain a career in the NFL. The offense has continued to regress.

Rhule, who has final say on roster and personnel decisions, has been undermined by his questionable handling of the quarterback position. The team released Cam Newton in March 2020. Carolina then signed Teddy Bridgewater to replace Newton. After one season, Carolina traded Bridgewater, who had moderate success with the team, to Denver for a sixth-round selection. It traded a haul of picks — including a 2022 second-rounder — for Sam Darnold, who has been wildly inconsistent when healthy. Then, the Panthers signed Newton, who was out of the game for a couple of months, once again.

Newton has struggled and Rhule fired former offensive coordinator Joe Brady last weekend before he had completed his second season in Carolina. This inefficiency in personnel moves is the mark of a coach not confident in his decision making, unsure of the direction he wants to take his team in and, perhaps, even one feeling external pressure.

Brian Daboll and the Bills rushing offense (and defense)

At this point, it's almost bizarre. In a 33-27 overtime loss against the Buccaneers, the Buffalo Bills again inexplicably abandoned the pursuit of a rushing game on offense. After facing criticism over the past several weeks for a lack of balance, the Bills had four rushing plays in the first half. All were by quarterback Josh Allen and one of them was a scramble on a broken play. Running an NFL offense is difficult, to be sure, but this part isn't complicated: if a struggling unit makes no attempt to even try to establish a rushing attack, defenses will send extra pass rushers, clamp down on receivers down the field and force the quarterback into bad passes. That's exactly what has happened to Josh Allen, who is at times pressing and making awful decisions.

On the other side of the ball, a unit that was among the league's best earlier in the season in rushing defense has now allowed 623 yards in its last three losses. The good sign for Buffalo is that when Tampa Bay got too conservative late in the game, Allen showed grit and carried the team all the way back from a 21-point deficit at the half. Buffalo is in the top three or four teams in the AFC in terms of pure talent. But at 7-6 and plunging down the AFC playoff picture, the Bills need to provide more structure on offense so that their formula to win is more than merely asking Allen to put the entire team on his back.

WFT as a threat in the NFC East

Well, now we know. After they had won four in a row, the Washington Football Team was looking like an upstart that could potentially disrupt the power structure in their division. But after dropping a much-needed game that Cowboys coach Mike McCarthy guaranteed, 27-20, it's clear Washington simply isn't ready to challenge Dallas in the NFC East.

In fact, this game showed that Dallas (9-4) should cruise to the rest of the way to a division title. Washington (6-7) had previously looked like it could play spoiler — with a rematch in Dallas coming in two weeks — but its ineptitude Sunday on third down (just three conversions on 14 attempts), total offensive collapse (29 total yards at halftime) and deficient offensive line (nine QB hurries allowed) point to this team being several pieces away from contending. It wasn't just third-down execution, either; Washington's early down plays failed to generate much yardage, leaving a series of third-and-longs. Dallas' own offensive struggles allowed this game to be much closer than it was, and the Cowboys have their own issues to sort through. But starting a key divisional game with a 24-point deficit at halftime and committing four turnovers will never be the sign of a winning team.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: NFL Week 14 winners, losers: Tom Brady, Jimmy Garoppolo are clutch