Browns celebrate change of luck

Sunday’s improbable win has Derek Anderson entrenched at quarterback.

BEREA (AP) — A week ago, the Cleveland Browns were engulfed in a quarterback controversy following another humiliating loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers.

What a difference a week makes.

After an improbable 51-45 win over the Cincinnati Bengals, the only controversy in Cleveland is how far the Browns’ stunning turnaround can take them.

“A win like that definitely helps the team psyche,” coach Romeo Crennel said Monday.

The Browns scored the fourth most points in team history, more than in their last five games combined.

They put up 554 yards of offense behind Derek Anderson, who lost the preseason competition to Charlie Frye.

Anderson’s five-touchdown performance ensured that at least a week will go by without anyone questioning the Browns’ swift trade of Frye to Seattle last week or whether rookie Brady Quinn should be the starter.

The win marked career days for Anderson, Braylon Edwards, Kellen Winslow and the guys in the Dawg Pound who dumped beer on Bengals wide receiver Chad Johnson.

Highlights

The highlights — Jamal Lewis chugging down the field for 216 yards, Edwards diving for one of his two touchdown grabs and Anderson throwing dart after dart — have aired over and over again.

Crennel, who gave game balls to the entire offense, hopes his players don’t watch them too many times.

“What’s going to happen now is that a lot of these guys will be told they are the best thing since sliced bread — they can run for 200 yards in a game and throw for 500 yards, get five touchdown passes and put 51 points on the board,” Crennel said. “The thing we have to do is, we have to get these guys to understand that nothing has changed.”

The message seems to have gotten through to the players, who parroted his words in the locker room.

Browns tight end Kellen Winslow, who reached 100 yards receiving for the first time, quietly told reporters Monday that it was just one win. He nitpicked the offense like a coordinator reviewing game film.

“There was still a lot of plays out there to be made. We can improve on a couple things,” he said. “We could have got more yards for Jamal.”

New mantra

On the other side of the locker room, center Hank Fraley was repeating the “one win” mantra.

“One win’s not going to get us to the Super Bowl,” Fraley said. “We’ve got to do this a lot more than one time. We’ve got to string a few together. Who knows, string ’em all together.”

The Browns haven’t won two straight games since Butch Davis was the coach.

They’ll look to do it behind Anderson, who notched his first victory as a starter. He threw for 328 yards, tied a team record for TD passes and now bears the weight of lofty expectations.

Crennel knows those kind of numbers won’t come again soon.

“The thing that we have to fight is to expect that there is going to be 51 points every week, because that doesn’t happen in the NFL,” Crennel said.

“Fifty-one points happens very seldom in an NFL game.”

The Browns also have to take a long look at their defense, which has surrendered 10 passing TDs in two games — six to Carson Palmer and four to Ben Roethlisberger.

For the defensive-minded Crennel, whose record against AFC North opponents improved to 2-12, that’s all the more reason not to look at Sunday’s game as anything more than a single victory.

“It’s the second game of the year. We are 1-1. I don’t know if this is the turning point or not,” he said. “Usually on turning points, what you have to do is when the season is over you can look back and pinpoint a game that you think is a turning point game.

“If we win the rest of them, I can say this is a turning point game.”