By Steve Wilstein
The Associated Press

PHILADELPHIA - Joe Jurevicius flew home with a message he couldn't wait to whisper to his struggling son: "Daddy's going out to try to help the Tampa Bay Buccaneers win the Super Bowl."

The Bucs are going to the Super Bowl against Oakland, in large part because Jurevicius found a way to put aside his worries for a day, to make one catch that changed the NFC championship game Sunday and ended a week of soaring and sinking emotions.

The 71-yard catch-and-run was for his newborn son, Michael William. For his wife, Meagan, who gave birth a couple of weeks prematurely. For his teammates, who prayed for him and his family.

It was a play that gave the Bucs the momentum they needed in a 27-10 victory against the Philadelphia Eagles.

"I've been at the highest. I've been at the lowest. I'm back at the highest," Jurevicius said. "When my kid gets healthy and looks back on this, I want him to be proud and remember this moment. My son is sick right now but he's a battler. It's going to be a very long process."

Jurevicius went from "the best day of my life" on Tuesday, when his wife gave birth to their first child, to several days and nights filled with fears and tears, hope and prayers that he would survive in good health.

He stayed home with his family, missing practices, and didn't arrive in Philadelphia until late Saturday afternoon to "high-fives and hugs" from his teammates.

Jurevicius isn't the big playmaker on the Bucs. He's often the third or fourth option on plays. But he's a key man who would have been sorely missed.

As his son struggled through the first 48 hours, Jurevicius thought several times that he might not make it to the game.

"Family is first," he said. "Football will always remain second to me."

By Thursday, after his son stabilized, Jurevicius decided he had to come.

"My family needed me to do this," he said. "It's what my son, my wife, my in-laws, my parents needed me to do. I needed to be out here. I needed to go run around. I needed to be hit. I needed to hit.

"My son is a fighter. For everything he's gone through this week, the least I could do is hop on a plane and get down here and try to put everything behind me and play football."

Jurevicius' big moment on the field came late in the first quarter, when the Bucs trailed 7-3. A fine white sheen of frost was just beginning to form on the artificial turf in the last game at frigid Veterans Stadium, and Eagles fans were whipping their white towels and roaring.

On third-and-2 at the Tampa 24, Bucs quarterback Brad Johnson threw a short pass to the 6-foot-5, 230-pound Jurevicius as he cut across the middle. He picked up a block, then took off down the left side of the field, cradling the ball first in his right arm, then his left, before getting pushed out of bounds at the 5.

It was a moment that briefly silenced the crowd, stopped all that towel-waving, and altered the course of the game. Two plays later, Mike Alstott crashed into the end zone for a 10-7 lead.

The Bucs, who hadn't scored an offensive touchdown in their last three visits to the Vet, dating to the 2000 playoffs, sensed that this time would be different.

"That play really got us going," Bucs coach Jon Gruden said.

The 28-year-old Jurevicius said he was grateful for Gruden's understanding during the week and would not forget his reassurances, when they spoke privately in the coach's office. Gruden told him everything would turn out all right.

"I've got three boys and I tried to put myself in his situation," Gruden said. "It was an emotional meeting that we had. I tip my hat to Joe, and I certainly pray for his wife and family. When you have a child that is born prematurely and does not look healthy ... it puts things in perspective. We gave Joe the flexibility and the freedom for him to do what he felt was right.

"For him to come up here Saturday afternoon, in spite of all that's happened to him, and deliver clutch plays, that tells you the kind of man you're talking about."

Jurevicius seemed overwhelmed afterward at how his week, filled with so many churning emotions, turned out.

Michael William was born at 6 pounds, 1 ounce, and Jurevicius figures that "by the time it's all said and done he's going to be 6-foot-5, 245." Someday, Jurevicius said, he'll tell his son the story of his birth and how it helped bring together a team that went to the Super Bowl.

"It's been the roughest week of my life and these guys made it a lot easier to come in here and try to forget everything that's gone on and just focus on the football game," Jurevicius said.

"I got a chill in this locker room before the game and it wasn't from the draft. I knew that we were going to do something special today and we did. Right now I'm on cloud nine. I can't wait to go home and give my son the biggest kiss in the world and hug my wife and tell my family I love them."

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Steve Wilstein is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at swilstein@ap.org

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