Was Browns victory over 49ers, Kevin Stefanski's Signature Win?

Well into year four of the Kevin Stefanski experience as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, it's always taken some mild mental gymnastics pinpoint the "signature win" on his resume.

Of course Stefanski deserves his flowers for being the only coach to lead the Browns to playoff in nearly two decades. Wildly enough though, the signature win of that that 2020 playoff season – a fever pitch, 48-37 Wild Card win over the Pittsburgh Steelers on the road – doesn't technically belong on his record. Mike Priefer was manning the sidelines as defacto head coach for that one, while the Browns actual head man was watching from his basement with Covid-19.

It's a technicality, but that one doesn't feel like it totally belongs to him. So what's next?

One week prior to that playoff win in Pittsburgh, the Browns beat their arch-rivals at home to clinch a playoff berth. Under normal circumstances this would probably be the one...except for the fact that it was a win over Mason Rudolph. With nothing to play for, Ben Roethlisberger rested, T.J. Watt rested, Cameron Heyward rested. It wasn't just a true matchup with the Steelers. The Brown were supposed to win, and they did.

There's was a Week Four win over the Dallas Cowboys in that same season, 49-38, that could very well qualify. That game felt like the 2020 Browns at the peak of their powers and hey, anytime you beat "America's Team," it's notable.

Nine weeks later, there was also a 41-35 win over the Tennessee Titans, a team that, at the time was regularly a larger threat in the AFC. Tennessee had also stomped Cleveland on its home turf to open the season a year prior. That win was was certainly a statement at the time.

Beyond those flimsy options, are back-to-back disappointing 7-9 seasons that produced nothign in the way of ''signature moments' for Stefanski. A 3-1 record against the Cincinnati Bengals during that span feels very hollow looking back. Same goes for a Thursday night win over the those pesky Steelers last fall.

There was that overtime home win against Tom Brady and the Tampa bay Buccaneers, over Thanksgiving Weekend in 2022. However, by then the Browns had dug themselves into such a deep hole that the slow march to Cancun trips and 18 holes was already on.

And so that brings us back to the 49ers win over the weekend.

Cleveland was armed with a knife in a gun fight against the San Francisco, yet somehow, it didn't matter. For years, the Browns have been on the other end of these types of games, most recently in Week Two against the Steelers. Mike Tomlin's group is infuriatingly good at winning games they have no business winning, the same way the Browns did on Sunday.

Not only that but you could sense the players had a resounding belief that they were going to win, and as the game wore on, it only grew stronger. That mentality starts with the head coach.

With a major assist to defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz, it's hard to dispute that to date this is Stefanski's signature win. On the heels of a week filled with external criticism over the way the way the organization was handling the Watson shoulder injury, Stefanski's team silenced the noise in one fell swoop.

Put it this way, the season wasn't over if they had lost that game, but to win it could change the entire trajectory of the Browns season.