The Browns Are 3-1, Sitting Atop the AFC North and the Dawg Pound Is Officially Barking

It wasn't pretty. It wasn't comfortable. It definitely wasn't stress-free. But Browns-Steelers games aren't supposed to be any of those things.

The Cleveland Browns are 3-1.

Read that again.

After beating the Pittsburgh Steelers 27-24 on Thursday Night Football, Cleveland is sitting atop the AFC North through four games, and the Dawg Pound has every reason to be barking right now. Was it a perfect football game? Absolutely not. The Browns committed 14 penalties, turned the ball over twice, watched a 21-10 halftime lead nearly disappear and somehow found themselves tied with Pittsburgh in the final two minutes.

But 3-1 is 3-1.

And beating Pittsburgh makes it feel even better.

The night didn't exactly start the way Cleveland wanted. Aaron Rodgers came out and gave Pittsburgh an early 7-0 lead, and for a few minutes it felt like we might be settling in for one of those annoying Steelers games where they somehow control everything despite never really looking that impressive.

Then Cleveland woke up.

Jaleel McLaughlin ripped off a 28-yard touchdown run early in the second quarter to tie it. Quinshon Judkins punched another one in from two yards out. Then Deshaun Watson found Harold Fannin Jr. for a touchdown late in the half, and suddenly the Browns had scored 21 points in the second quarter and Huntington Bank Field was rocking.

That second quarter was probably the best stretch of football Cleveland played all night.

Watson wasn't perfect, but he was good when Cleveland needed him to be. He finished 24-of-33 for 268 yards with a touchdown and an interception, and there were stretches where the offense actually looked comfortable moving the football. Denzel Boston provided the big-play element with 89 receiving yards, KC Concepcion Jr. continued to get involved, and Judkins gave Cleveland another 96 total yards between rushing and receiving.

The frustrating part is that this game probably never should have become as stressful as it did.

Cleveland took a 21-10 lead into halftime and neither team scored in the third quarter. At that point, you're thinking the Browns just need to play clean football for another 15 minutes and get out of there with a divisional win.

Apparently that would've been too easy.

Rodgers started finding some openings in the fourth quarter. Pittsburgh cut the lead to 21-16 with a touchdown to Darnell Washington. Andre Szmyt answered with a 44-yard field goal to push it back to 24-16, and it felt like Cleveland had finally created enough breathing room.

Nope.

Because with 1:46 remaining, Rodgers found Pat Freiermuth for a touchdown and then ran in the two-point conversion himself to tie the game 24-24.

Of course.

It's Browns-Steelers. Why would anything ever be simple?

But this is where I give Cleveland a lot of credit. Instead of folding after blowing an 11-point halftime lead, the Browns got the football back and did enough. Watson connected with Concepcion to help move them into Pittsburgh territory, and even after taking a sack that made the situation much harder, Cleveland trusted Szmyt from 56 yards.

He drilled it.

Twenty-seven to twenty-four with 15 seconds left.

And because apparently kicking a 56-yard game-winner against Pittsburgh wasn't enough, Grant Delpit decided to put the perfect ending on it. Rodgers tried to take one final shot downfield and Delpit picked him off with 10 seconds remaining.

Ballgame.

Goodnight Pittsburgh.

That's the part I'm taking away from this game. There are a million things Cleveland needs to clean up. Fourteen penalties for 88 yards is ridiculous. Two turnovers will get you beat against better teams. The Browns had opportunities to put Pittsburgh away much earlier and instead allowed Rodgers and the Steelers to hang around until the final seconds.

But they still won.

Good teams aren't going to play perfect football 17 times. Sometimes you dominate. Sometimes you survive. Sometimes your kicker has to drill one from 56 yards and your safety has to pick off Aaron Rodgers 10 seconds later.

The standings don't ask how pretty it was.

They just say 3-1.

And I'm starting to really like what we're seeing from this Browns team. They can run the football. Watson has shown enough through the air to move this offense. Young players are contributing. The defense can make the big play when it absolutely needs one. More importantly, Cleveland is finding ways to win games instead of finding new ways to lose them.

Any Browns fan knows exactly how important that distinction is.

It's only four games. Nobody needs to start booking hotels for February yet. There is a ton of football left, and this division has a way of becoming complete chaos before the season is over.

But we're allowed to enjoy this one.

The Browns beat the Steelers under the lights.

They're 3-1.

They're sitting atop the AFC North.

And after years of watching this franchise find every imaginable way to make Sundays miserable, I'm certainly not going to apologize for enjoying the view from first place.

The one thing that puts a damper on this win is the Mason Graham injury, because that's the storyline I'm going to be watching closely over the next few days. Graham injured his left knee during Pittsburgh's opening drive when his leg got caught awkwardly underneath him, and while he was initially able to walk off the field, he never returned. Even more concerning, he was reportedly leaving the stadium after the game on crutches with a brace around that left knee. We don't know the severity yet, and Kevin Stefanski didn't have an update after the game, so there's no reason to speculate beyond that. But losing Graham for any significant amount of time would be a massive blow to this defense. He entered Thursday with four sacks through three games and had recorded at least one in every game this season. He's quickly becoming one of the most important pieces of this Browns defensive front, so while 3-1 feels damn good this morning, Browns fans are definitely going to be holding their breath waiting for that Graham update.

Wasn't pretty.

Don't care.

The Browns have the Pound barking right now.

3-1. First place.

Woof woof.