MIAMI GARDENS — Miami Dolphins rookie quarterback Quinn Ewers looks to build off a debut as a starter in which he exhibited composure, was poised in the pocket, orchestrated the team’s complex offense and made his share of throws while having some that didn’t go his way.

He gets his second shot at starting in the NFL back at home Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (7-8).

“I want to see growth, and that comes in a numerous amount of ways,” said Dolphins coach Mike McDaniel before the team’s Wednesday practice after a Tuesday walkthrough as players get Christmas Day off Thursday. “I saw some (Tuesday) with how he was quarterbacking the group. He took a step forward in terms of his confidence, his disposition.”

Ewers was 20 of 30 for 260 yards and two interceptions, with one not necessarily his fault, in a 45-21 defeat that got away from the team as a whole.

“There’s a lot of promising things from this start and we’re really encouraged by a lot of his performance,” offensive coordinator Frank Smith said Tuesday.

For the young quarterback, it all starts with how he operates McDaniel’s complicated offense, which involves an array of formations and pre-snap motions. The coach said he was “pleasantly surprised” by how the rookie out of Texas handled those aspects in his first start.

“There’s people moving everywhere before the ball is snapped, and a lot of that was on (previous starter) Tua (Tagovailoa),” senior passing game coordinator Bobby Slowik said Tuesday. “And (Ewers) almost never had an error in that regard, and I think that’s a lot to handle. I think Quinn is working to get there and is pretty dang close, but that’s probably where there’s a few minute adjustments, a little bit of the pre-snap stuff but not a lot. We’re still going to do everything that we do.”

Ewers noted there was only one pre-snap issue the team had in last Sunday’s game.

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Slowik gives Tagovailoa high marks in that aspect of his game that Ewers tries to replicate. Another area is Tagovailoa’s anticipation on his throws.

“Tua’s really exceptional about anticipatory throws, letting the ball go early, particularly before receivers are even out of their break,” Slowik said. “Quinn doesn’t necessarily do that as naturally as Tua did, but he can make up for it.

“He’s got a really whippy release. He might throw later, but it might get there at the same time because of how the ball just fires off his wrist.”

“It’s definitely true,” Ewers said, when the notion was mentioned to him. “Throughout the week, we’ve even changed up some of the footwork that Tua would do to how it would time up with my footwork, with my anticipation.”

There were a few instances last Sunday of timing appearing a bit off with a receiver, as Ewers hasn’t had as many reps with Dolphins pass-catchers as Tagovailoa has.

Ewers said he’ll have to rely on the “QB math” he’s equipped with in order to fine-tune his timing with different receivers, calculating how different targets break on their routes and run to a spot.

“We may not have been good at math in school, but we’re pretty good at math on the field,” Ewers said.

Against the Buccaneers, Ewers will face coach Todd Bowles’ aggressive defense, which ranks fifth in blitz percentage (29.6 percent). The rookie will have to take part in the mind games of how much Tampa will pressure or if the Bucs will counter off the threat of the blitz.

“I feel like it’s notorious that people are going to pressure rookie quarterbacks more,” said Ewers, when asked about the mind games. “Sometimes, it can work in your favor. Sometimes, they get ahead of you.”

Ewers is locked in during this final stretch of the season in which he has taken over as the starter. When asked Wednesday if anyone famous had reached out to him after his debut as a starter, he replied he didn’t know because he has barely checked his phone but that he might have a better idea in two weeks.

Dolphins Deep Dive: What did we see from Ewers in first start? | VIDEO