Lions Get First Shutout in a Decade, 23-0 : NFC: Detroit gains its best start since 1962 with victory over Tampa Bay. Sanders rushes for 187 yards in 29 carries.

George Wilson was the Detroit coach and Barry Sanders was still six years away from being born the last time the Lions started this well.

Sanders turned in the second-best rushing game of his career Sunday, with 187 yards in 29 carries, and the Lions defeated the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, 23-0, for their first 7-2 start since 1962.

“That says it all. We’re 7-2,” Sanders said. “We should be 8-1, but we’ll take it.”

It was the first shutout for Detroit since the Lions blanked the Buccaneers, 11-0, on Sept. 4, 1983.

It was Sanders’ best rushing game ever in the Silverdome and ranked second overall to the 220-yard game he had against the Minnesota Vikings in 1991.

Detroit quarterback Rodney Peete, who completed 16 of 22 passes for 134 yards, scored on a nine-yard draw play and Derrick Moore, the Lions’ short-yardage specialist, had a one-yard touchdown run. Jason Hanson added three field goals.

“We went into the game thinking we wanted to run the ball,” said Peete, who has quarterbacked the Lions to four consecutive victories.

Tampa Bay’s Craig Erickson, who had completed six touchdown passes in his previous two games, including four in a victory last week at Atlanta, completed 13 of 26 passes for 122 yards with one interception.

The Lions took the opening kickoff and drove to the Buccaneer five. But a holding call against Jimmy Johnson put the ball at the 15 and four plays later Hanson kicked a 29-yard field goal for a 3-0 lead. Hanson also had a 49-yard field goal in the second quarter.

On the Lions’ first possession of the second half, Peete completed four of four passes for 54 yards and ran twice for 14 yards, including the touchdown, as Detroit drove 81 yards in 10 plays.

Pat Swilling’s interception late in the third quarter gave the Lions the ball at the Tampa Bay 35. Sanders had runs of 22, five and seven yards, before Moore--behind a block by linebacker-turned-fullback Chris Spielman--took it in for the touchdown.