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    • The Ravens glaring error emerges against the Bengals as a major looming problem
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    The Ravens glaring error emerges against the Bengals as a major looming problem

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    BALTIMORE – John Harbaugh wanted to congratulate Ja’Marr Chase on his great game Thursday night.

    “I was looking for him after the game, but I couldn’t find him,” the Baltimore Ravens coach said shortly after his team earned a 35-34 victory over Chase’s Cincinnati Bengals.

    Harbaugh then paused for a moment during a comical moment of collective self-awareness before adding, “I think that was appropriate.”

    The response drew laughter from reporters in the M&T Bank Stadium press room after a hard-fought victory. But Harbaugh also knows his team’s glaring mistake is no laughing matter.

    With the victory, the Ravens became the third AFC team with seven wins this season. Their offense entered the night averaging 7.13 yards per play – the second-most in NFL history through nine games – and put on another show with 28 second-half points and four touchdown passes from quarterback Lamar Jackson, who continues to burnish his latest MVP resume. .

    But a game the Ravens promoted with a “Purple Rising” theme — a nod to their new alternate helmets — proved well-suited for a defense bruised, battered and perhaps even exposed by the Bengals.

    Chase, clearly Cincinnati’s main offensive weapon — and especially on a night when colleague Tee Higgins was inactive with a quad injury — continually ran through and past Ravens defenders, collecting 11 catches for 264 yards and three scores, including a 67 and 70 meters. Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow passed for 428 yards and threw a fourth-down TD pass to tight end Tanner Hudson.

    “That’s just not our standard of defense and we know that,” Pro Bowl defensive tackle Nnamdi Madubuike said.

    “We’re going to find ways in practice to improve and get better, and I know the guys in the locker room feel the same way I do and we’re going to get that done.”

    Yet this wasn’t just a bad night at the office. It’s a worrying pattern. The Ravens entered Thursday’s game ranked last in the league in pass defense. Then the Bengals racked up 421 yards through the air — 50 more than Baltimore’s previous worst performance of 2024.

    Cincinnati attacked without fear, with Burrow repeatedly targeting Chase and often connecting with deep shots. The Bengals scored touchdowns on all three of their red zone trips, opted to go for it four times on fourth down and racked up 470 yards of offense.

    The Ravens’ penchant for self-sabotage included prolonging Cincinnati drives with premature penalties, including a defensive call on cornerback Brandon Stephens on fourth-and-goal of the game’s opening possession. Running back Chase Brown ran in for a touchdown on the next play.

    Stephens had a particularly rough night, narrowly missing an interception in the end zone when his foot hit the sideline. He also tried to cover Chase on the 70-yard touchdown, but didn’t seem to get the safety help he expected. To Stephens’ credit, he answered every question posed to him after the game.

    “We have to go look at the film, see what it was, but it’s just a breakdown of the coverage,” he said of Chase’s biggest play.

    “Honestly, man, we can’t afford any mistakes. We cannot afford errors in reporting and communication; they cost us large amounts of money. They exposed our mistakes.”

    Complicating matters further was the ankle injury All-Pro defenseman Kyle Hamilton suffered toward the end of the second quarter. He was in street clothes after halftime, although Harbaugh didn’t seem particularly concerned about the injury after the game.

    But he should be concerned about the downward defensive trend.

    These Ravens can score almost at will, their 31.8 points per game on average being the best in the AFC. But Thursday’s win was nevertheless their fourth, within one score.

    But when Baltimore faces better defensive teams than Cincinnati — and the Ravens play the Pittsburgh Steelers and Los Angeles Chargers in their next two games — they will likely find that the offense can’t save them every time. his turn, just as that wasn’t possible against the defensive-oriented Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs in last season’s AFC championship game.

    “(W)e have to turn over every stone as a defensive staff, and we have to figure out a way to prevent these plays from happening,” Harbaugh said, “because they shouldn’t be happening.”

    Frankly, this is a unit with a rookie coordinator in Zach Orr, and a unit that lost several key pieces during free agency — not to mention Orr’s predecessor, Mike Macdonald, who is now the head coach of the Seattle Seahawks. It was probably never realistic to expect Baltimore to give up the fewest points in the league again, as it did in 2023.

    And there were positive signs on Thursday.

    Madubuike continually harassed Burrow, dismissing him three times after starting the game with just a few on the season. Trailing 21-7 in the third quarter, cornerback Marlon Humphrey stripped Brown for a crucial fumble that led to an ensuing touchdown and sparked Baltimore’s comeback. And with the game hanging in the balance, the Ravens held their ground — and you might say the referees held their flags, too — in the final minute, as Cincinnati failed to convert for a two-point win.

    But if these are building blocks for improvement, Harbaugh and Co. know. that there is still a lot of work to be done if they want to overtake the first-place Steelers in the division and, down the road, possibly wrest the Lombardi Trophy from Kansas City. .

    “That’s not the standard,” said Harbaugh, sounding like his Pittsburgh counterpart Mike Tomlin. “We have to be much better. We also need to take the pressure off our offense. On the defensive side, we have to do that. But for them to keep fighting like they did and find a way to win the game – that’s the most important thing in the end.”

    Especially if the Ravens want to avoid wasting another spectacular opportunity to become immortal.

    ***

    Follow Nate Davis of USA TODAY Sports on X, formerly Twitter, @ByNateDavis.

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