Ravens coach John Harbaugh has preached ad nauseam this season that the NFL is a week-to-week league and the goal is to go 1-0 each week.

By that maxim, the present goal is simple: If Baltimore beats the Cleveland Browns on Sunday at M&T Bank Stadium, the Ravens will be AFC North champs for a second straight year and clinch the No. 3 seed in the conference behind the Kansas City Chiefs and Buffalo Bills. Doing so would also guarantee them at least a wild-card playoff game at home, likely against the Los Angeles Chargers, who they beat last month, or the Pittsburgh Steelers for a third time this season after the teams split against each other at home.

After an 0-2 start and major questions about defensive coordinator Zach Orr and his floundering unit, among other early shortcomings, it’s an enviable position that not all that long felt unattainable.

“There were some tough conversations,” cornerback Marlon Humphrey said after the Ravens’ 31-2 blowout of the Texans in Houston on Christmas Day. “We still believed, but it did seem far away, because it just seemed like every single guy was having a mishap at just the wrong time. It seemed like every time we were out of position, not called right, we were getting hit on.

“The good thing is earlier in the season, we kept being like, ‘What are we doing wrong? What are we doing wrong?’ And it was simple. We just needed to get all 11 guys doing their job.”

It took plenty of adjustments, too.

On defense, that meant moving safety Ar’Darius Washington into the starting lineup for Marcus Williams and jettisoning Eddie Jackson. Safety Kyle Hamilton was deployed deeper on the field to help clean up the back end and inside linebacker Trenton Simpson was benched in favor of a rotation of veterans Malik Harrison and Chris Board. Orr also simplified some of the scheme and dialed back his substitution packages.

Offensively, quarterback Lamar Jackson continued to elevate his game in every facet from last season, when he was the league’s MVP. Harbaugh settled on his three new starters along the offensive line and future Hall of Fame running back Derrick Henry unsurprisingly found his footing in coordinator Todd Monken’s offense. Baltimore also avoided having its failed Diontae Johnson experiment implode the locker room by cutting ties with the disgruntled receiver sooner than later.

It has added up to wins in four of the last five and six of eight with the Ravens playing their best football when it starts to matter most and looking capable of a deep postseason run.

Perhaps that’s why Harbaugh strode through the visiting locker room at NRG Stadium chest out, smile wide and feeling his oats, at least in the moment, after Baltimore’s dominance of AFC South champion Houston. The Ravens had entered their span of three games in 11 days two games back of the Steelers in the division and came out of it with a one-game lead after three straight victories, including two on the road (albeit one of those was against the lowly New York Giants).

“It says so much,” Harbaugh said when asked what the turnaround means. “It says we’re not done yet, because it’s been done, and the next thing is going to be the next game. We need to be 1-0 to win the AFC North, and that will be our focus after we get some rest.”

It has helped, too, that Baltimore has remained remarkably healthy for much of the season and especially down the stretch.

Now, the Ravens need one more win to reach their first goal of winning the division.

While the Browns (3-12) beat Baltimore in Cleveland in Week 8, that was when both teams were operating much differently. The Browns had 17 players on injured reserve entering Week 17, including running back Nick Chubb and linebacker Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah, and could be down to third-string quarterback Dorian Thompson-Robinson if Jameis Winston — who threw for 334 yards and three touchdowns in that win over the Ravens — remains out with a shoulder injury.

A win by the Ravens presents the most favorable path, but there are of course others.

If the Ravens lose and the Steelers beat the Bengals in Pittsburgh, the Steelers would win the division and be the No. 3 seed, while Baltimore would slip to No. 5 with a return trip to Houston in the wild-card round. If the Ravens win, Pittsburgh loses and the Chargers beat the Raiders in Las Vegas, the Steelers would be the No. 6 seed, and if the inverse happens the Chargers would be the No. 6 seed.

But Jackson has said he isn’t worried about all of those machinations. Nor does he care about what happened earlier this season.

“I believe how our season has gone — the regular season — it just explains how the NFL is,” he said. “It really doesn’t matter how you start off. It’s about how you finish, and I believe we’re finishing pretty well right now.”

Have a news tip? Contact Brian Wacker at bwacker@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/brianwacker1.