A week after holding San Diego's LaDainian Tomlinson to 24 yards on 14 carries, the defense was gashed by Pierre Thomas, a former undrafted free agent from Illinois, for 102 yards.

"It's something that we definitely have to address this week," Smith said of his run defense.

Smith knows that if the Falcons are going to make the playoffs, they have to tighten their run defense.

The Saints amassed 184 yards rushing, tied for the second-most yards the Falcons have given up this season. Philadelphia ran for 192 yards. Kansas City also ran for 184 yards.

The Falcons will face two strong running attacks in their final three games. Tampa Bay went into their Monday night game at Carolina ranked 11th in rushing at 118 yards a game.

Minnesota, with the league's top rusher, Adrian Peterson, is fifth in the league at 140.4 a game. St. Louis is 28th at 91.3 yards per game.

"That's definitely one of our main priorities is our run defense," safety Erik Coleman said. "We had a setback [Sunday]."

Smith, a former defensive coordinator, has gone over what went wrong on the draw plays the Saints were able to execute.

Reggie Bush had a 43-yard run and Thomas had two 18-yard runs right through the middle of the nickel defense.

"To tell you the truth, it was speed," Coleman said. "Their offensive line did a great job of blocking yesterday, and then Reggie Bush hit that draw at full speed.

"You get a guy that explosive into the open field, in some space, it's going to be a problem bringing him down. He made a great play. They had a great play called on us."

No second-guess

After having time to reflect, Smith said on Monday he still would not have gambled on fourth down against the Saints.

Trailing 29-25, Smith elected to punt instead of going for it on fourth-and-5 from the Falcons' 35-yard line. The Saints got the ball back and ran out the clock.

"I've got no reservations about it," Smith said. "With 3:15 to go, fourth-and-5 from our . . . 35, I felt like we'd punt them back, which we did. Michael [Koenen] hit a big punt.

"They had the ball first-and-10 on the 13 with 3:15 to go. We had two timeouts and the two-minute [warning stoppage]. If we are able to stop them, we were going to get the ball back to our offense in better field position than if we'd taken the gamble on fourth down."

Saints coach Sean Payton gambled on a fourth down to keep their game-winning drive alive. While Smith won't be confused with a riverboat gambler, he has gone for it on several fourth downs this season.

"In hindsight, and hindsight's 20-20, you made the wrong decision," Smith said. "But I had all the confidence in the world that we would go out there and be able to stop them in a four minute situation."

Norwood slowed

Running back Jerious Norwood's production has dipped since he injured a rib against the Broncos on Nov. 16. He hasn't run the ball more than five times against Carolina, San Diego and New Orleans. He carried more than 10 times in three games before the injury.

"Jerious has not had the breakout explosive plays that he had earlier in the season," Smith said. "He has been nursing a injury with the ribs, but they've done a nice job in bottling him up. People are aware of when Jerious is in the game."

Coverage unit

The Falcons have to tighten up their coverage units for Tampa Bay after giving up a key 88-yard return late against New Orleans.

"There were actually three missed tackles on the kickoff return," Smith said. "There were also a couple of leverage issues where guys were out of position."