Browns looking to stop 25-game road skid

Players confident those woes will end

Associated Press

CLEVELAND

For more than three years, the Browns have only tripped on the road.

Cleveland hasn’t won an away game since Oct. 11, 2015, a losing streak that has reached 25 straight — just one shy of the NFL record for road futility held by the Detroit Lions (2007-10).

As the Browns prepared for Sunday’s game in Cincinnati against the Bengals (5-5), and a clumsy reunion with former coach Hue Jackson, interim coach Gregg Williams delivered a specific message to his players about the losing streak.

“Don’t hide from it,” Williams said. “Be aware of it.”

The Browns (3-6-1) have dropped all four road games this season, but two came in overtime and another could have gone to OT.

In Week 2, the Browns lost 21-18 at New Orleans, a defeat that still stings but looks more impressive given how well the Saints are playing.

Two weeks later, the Browns fell 45-42 in OT at Oakland. And on Oct. 21, Cleveland lost 26-23 at Tampa Bay after a 59-yard field goal late in overtime.

Those close calls have the Browns convinced their road woes will soon hit a dead end.

Safety Damarious Randall believes it will happen Sunday. Randall spiced up this week’s matchup by essentially guaranteeing a Cleveland win Friday when he was asked about facing Bengals star wide receiver A.J. Green, who is questionable with a toe injury.

“If they don’t have A.J., they’re getting their (rear ends) beat,” Randall said. “I hope he plays, to make the game a little bit more interesting.”

The battle of Ohio is almost always interesting, and the Browns go into it with some momentum following their best all-around performance in a win over Atlanta on Nov. 11 and a bye week.

The Browns are healthy and hungry. They’re certainly starved for a road win.

If the Browns want to become a legitimate playoff contender, they need to win anywhere, at any time.

“It’d be big,” left guard Joel Bitonio said. “You’ve got to win on the road at some point to be a good team in this league, and we’re trying to improve, every week, at that. But if we can go out there and win a road battle, it’s been stressed we haven’t won a road game in a long time, it’d be great for us. It’d be another step in the right direction.”

Rookie quarterback Baker Mayfield orchestrated plenty of road wins at Oklahoma, but understands the difference between college and the NFL.

“It is not the same as college rivalries, so I think it is very easy in college to kind of come together,” he said. “You have every reason to do that. Now, it is much more professional, so you have to find ways to bring everybody together to have that mentality that your back is against the wall and that it is just you on the road, and you have to find a way to win.”

NOTES

TE David Njoku (knee) and C JC Tretter (ankle) are questionable for Sunday. ... Williams wouldn’t disclose his starting left tackle, but it appears Greg Robinson will make his third straight start.