Atlanta Falcons safety Justin Simmons stood in front of his locker on the left side of the room, sporting a mint green suit in the aftermath of Atlanta’s thrilling 36-30 overtime victory over the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Thursday night inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Simmons was a part of a rocky defensive effort, but one that proved good enough to vault the Falcons into an early-season lead in the NFC South — and that, Simmons said, is all that matters.

“The biggest thing is that win,” Simmons said. “Doesn’t matter if it’s 10-3 or 30-something to 30-something, as long as we win.”

Atlanta’s defense appeared capable of achieving both scoring thresholds Thursday night, which proved to be a tale of two halves.

The Buccaneers had four full drives in the first half and scored on each of them, netting three touchdowns, one field goal and 24 points on the scoreboard. They were averaging nearly nine yards per play.

But the Falcons came out of the locker room with an altered gameplan that led to a more stingy defensive attack. They limited Tampa Bay to just six points and 111 net yards of offense on 26 plays, an average of 4.3 yards per snap.

Buccaneers quarterback Baker Mayfield completed 7-of-9 passes for 49 yards, though a seven-yard sack in the redzone left Tampa Bay with 42 net yards on passing plays in the second half. Atlanta, meanwhile, had 241 yards from quarterback Kirk Cousins.

Tampa Bay rushed 16 times for 69 yards, 43 of which came on six scrambles from Mayfield. The Buccaneers’ running backs, Rachaad White and Bucky Irving, totaled 10 carries for 24 yards and a crucial fumble from Irving that cost Tampa Bay three points and plenty of clock on the penultimate drive.

But how did the Falcons do it? With the same recipe they used the week prior: getting back to their style. After a blitz-heavy first half finished with no further pressure applied, Falcons defensive coordinator Jimmy Lake returned to his bend-but-don’t-break roots, and Tampa Bay struggled completing drives.

“They definitely weren’t playing as aggressive,” Mayfield said. “They weren’t pressuring as much. Kind of dropping back and making us work our way down the field.”

The Buccaneers’ first drive of the second half ended with a punt. Right tackle Justin Skule’s holding penalty put Tampa Bay behind the chains and it failed to recover.

On the next drive, the Buccaneers marched deep into Falcons territory, but defensive tackle David Onyemata sacked Mayfield on 3rd and 3 from inside Atlanta’s 10-yard line. Tampa Bay settled for a field goal.

The draft after, Buccaneers kicker Chase McLaughlin hit a 53-yard field goal as Atlanta’s defense held serve after Tampa Bay crossed midfield.

But after a pair of scoring drives, the Buccaneers’ offense went quiet.

Tampa Bay’s seven-play, 31-yard, clock-chewing series late in the fourth quarter ended with Irving’s fumble. The possession after, the Buccaneers inherited the ball at Atlanta’s 34-yard line, with linebacker Lavonte David intercepting Cousins. Players on both sides said postgame they thought David’s takeaway effectively ended the game.

But the Falcons forced the Buccaneers to punt, as a pair of negative plays to White paired with a holding penalty on center Graham Barton pushed Tampa Bay out of field goal range.

Simmons said Atlanta’s defense merely wanted to give its offense the ball back. It did more than that, keeping the deficit at a field goal and making life significantly easier for Cousins and company.

The Falcons marched into field goal range, and kicker Younghoe Koo made a game-tying 52-yard field goal as time expired. Atlanta won the coin toss in overtime, received the kickoff and scored a walk-off 45-yard touchdown on a pass from Cousins to receiver KhaDarel Hodge.

Tampa Bay never saw the ball again after its punt.

[ Buccaneers ‘Shi–ed Down Our Leg’ in Collapse at Falcons]

White, speaking postgame, gave credit to Lake’s in-game adjustments, along with noting the importance of defensive tackle Grady Jarrett, who made four tackles over the final 30 minutes of regulation.

“I think we were just moving in circles with things,” White said. “They did a good job. Jimmy Lake did a good job. They started stunting and sending some blitzes into the line. They kind of tried to slow it down and that’s what they did. Then Grady Jarrett had a couple good plays.”

Buccaneers head coach Todd Bowles wasn’t as generous to Atlanta’s defense and put a significant portion of blame on Tampa Bay’s offense for a lack of execution.

“They made some adjustments, but we missed a lot of plays, too,” Bowles said. “We missed a lot of plays. We can’t play the Bucs and the Falcons.”

Tampa Bay’s box score shows 30 points, 333 net yards and 6.5 yards per play. It had only one turnover, and Mayfield completed 19-of-24 passes.

But the Buccaneers ultimately didn’t do enough to win, in part because of Atlanta’s offense having its most productive game of the season but also due to a strong defensive effort down the stretch.

Falcons head coach Raheem Morris is also pleased with the strides his defense made stopping the run. Tampa Bay totaled 26 carries for 160 yards, but Morris believes context is important.

White sprung a 56-yard run in the second quarter. Mayfield had 42 yards as a scrambler on designed passing plays. On the Buccaneers’ other 19 carries, they rushed for just 62 yards, an average of 3.3 yards per carry.

But White’s big play and an inability to contain the quarterback post-snap can’t simply be removed — and the Falcons know it.

“We didn’t play nearly well enough on defense, myself included,” Simmons said, citing tackling struggles. “But what a game from our offense. Obviously, it’ll always come down to a team win — we did better in the second half defensively — but man, offense, just [a] heck of a job from them.”

Rookie linebacker JD Bertrand, who played 72% of Atlanta’s defensive snaps in his first extended action due to the injury-related absence of starter Troy Andersen, said the Falcons entered Thursday night with two specific goals.

Atlanta wanted to stop Tampa Bay’s rushing attack and eliminate star receiver Mike Evans. The Buccaneers averaged 6.2 yards per carry, and Evans caught five passes for 62 yards and two touchdowns.

But within context, the Falcons’ run defense was serviceable. The same is true for Atlanta’s coverage on Evans, whose biggest play — a 23-yard touchdown grab — came in a one-on-one against backup nickel Antonio Hamilton Sr., who entered the game due to starter Dee Alford’s concussion.

The raw numbers aren’t great. The context is much better. And in Bertrand’s eyes, the most important number — the final score — shows Atlanta’s defense satisfied the goal enough to win.

“Obviously, we’re going to go back there and there’s going to be some plays we want,” Bertrand said. “That’s how it’s always going to be.”

But the Falcons have the luxury of entering their mini-bye week with a victory. Film sessions and resulting corrections were a given. Being able to do them after winning was not.

A key message in Atlanta’s locker room throughout the summer and into the regular season centers around running the NFC South. The Falcons beat the two teams ahead of them in the division at the time of their meetings in the New Orleans Saints and Buccaneers.

In both games, Atlanta struggled in one phase.

Against the Saints, the Falcons failed to score an offensive touchdown. Their defense and special teams each found the endzone while succeeding enough in their own facets to win.

On Thursday night, while Atlanta’s defense had no answer in the first half for the Buccaneers’ offense, Cousins kept the game close — and when the Falcons needed a stop late, their defense delivered. The offense capitalized. The special teams unit tied the game, and the offense won it in overtime.

Atlanta’s next step is playing complementary football for all 60 minutes — but in the meantime, the Falcons are winning, and they’re proving more and more about their intangible makeup in the process.

“We’re finding different ways to win,” Simmons said, “and we’re winning early, so it’s a good confidence builder for us.”

So far, Kirk Cousins is worth every penny, nickel, dime and quarter inside of his four-year contract with the Atlanta Falcons for $180 million.

Hear that sound?

That’s Falcons officials slapping hi-fives between themselves and their accountants after they ignored Cousins’ birth certificate (36 to begin the season) and Achilles surgery (which came after he missed most of last season with the Minnesota Vikings) to give the quarterback all of that loot in March.

Consider this:

• After six consecutive losing seasons, the Falcons are 3-2 overall and leading the NFC South at 2-0. Yeah, they’ve been “resilient,” as Falcons head coach Raheem Morris likes to say, and Younghoe Koe has remained among the NFL’s all-time clutch kickers. That said, the primary reason for this early spurt of goodness for the Falcons is Cousins has been Captain Kirk indeed more often than not during the fourth quarter.
• You get the feeling Cousins still is shredding the secondary of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He did so early, often and throughout an improbable (FYI: that’s a common word these days for the Falcons) 36-30 victory in overtime Thursday night in Atlanta at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
• In the end, Cousins completed 42 of 58 passes for 509 yards and four touchdowns. As the football gods would have it, he broke the franchise record for passing yards in a game held by the same Matt Ryan who was inducted Thursday night into the Falcons Ring of Honor at halftime.
• Achilles issue? What Achilles issue?

As for the latter, after the Falcons used the NFL’s head-to-head tiebreaker to slip just ahead of the 3-2 Bucs in the division, I told Cousins that he looked totally healthy and more like 26 than 36.

Does that visual match reality?

“That’s a good question,” said Cousins, in his 13th NFL season after he played the previous six with the Vikings before his opening six with Washington.

“I think I feel somewhere in between there. I feel good. I think being a pocket passer, and I’ve talked to some retired quarterbacks and asked them, do I need to be a scrambler to maintain production in this league, because there are so many talented running quarterbacks? The feedback I got was, no. You’re always going to have to do it from the pocket. Be accurate. That’s the key.

“So that’s kind of the way I’ve always played. I think it sets me up well as I get older to be able to still do it even if my body isn’t at its best, because standing back there from the pocket, you know, you don’t have to be quite the same athlete. No, I feel good.”

I had one more question for Cousins: Do you believe you are completely healed from that Achilles surgery?

“I do, yeah. Yeah, I do,” Cousins said. “And then there’s always the bumps and bruises that come from playing. My thumb hurts right now. My left knee. You’re always going to have stuff. Just play through it.”

No problem there.

Ask the Bucs, who haven’t stopped rubbing their eyes — along with those watching Thursday night’s nationally televised broadcast — as Cousins did it again.

Three games after Cousins took the Falcons from defeat to victory against the Eagles in Philadelphia during the final minutes, and four days after he did the same at home against the New Orleans Saints, there was his latest miracle.

Somehow, after the Bucs resembled the Eagles and the Saints by having a game down the stretch virtually signed, sealed and delivered against the Falcons, Cousins turned that into a mirage. He took the Falcons 80 yards with the greatest of ease for Younghoe Koo’s 52-yard field goal with no time left in regulation play.

That pushed the game into overtime at 30-30.

Then, moments after woozy No. 1 wide receiver Drake London left the field for the Falcons during the opening drive of extra minutes, Cousins rifled another of his many perfect throws for the night through Tampa Bay defenders. This time, his pass was to fifth-string wide receiver KhaDarel Hodge who sprinted for a game-winning catch and run of 45 yards.

It was Hodge highlighting this Falcons’ thriller, and it was Koo, and it was “resiliency,” but it was mostly Cousins.

All you need to know is:

• Cousins just set an NFL record by throwing for over 450 yards for a third different team (Washington, Minnesota and Atlanta).
• Cousins managed his 30th career game-winning drive in the fourth quarter or overtime to rank fifth among active quarterbacks.
• Cousins doesn’t have a worry in the world these days about his Achilles or his age, thank you.

Kirk Cousins threw a career-high 509 yards for four touchdowns as the Atlanta Falcons secured a 36-30 overtime win against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

The Falcons, trailing 30-27 with one second left on the clock in the final quarter, forced overtime when Younghoe Koo hit a 52-yard field goal.

The Bucs paid the price for losing the coin toss in overtime and failed to have possession again.

Cousins twice found Drake London as the Falcons progressed to the endzone and he put a 45-yard pass through the middle for KhaDarel Hodge to secure the win.

“I spread it around and the players made plays,” said Cousins, who joined the Falcons in a four-year deal earlier this year.

“I’m grateful for the progress we’ve made. We’re getting better and better each week.”

The win was the Falcons’ third of the season, after winning two and losing two of their first four matches.

“I’m proud of the grit,” Cousins said.

“In this league, that’s what it takes. We were gritty tonight.”