The holiday spirit has officially hit the Ravens’ locker room. John Harbaugh began his postgame news conference Saturday with a message he had shared with his players only minutes before, one apt for a team that had just clinched a spot in the playoffs.

“Rejoice.”

Harbaugh has been here before. The Ravens have made the postseason six of the past seven years and 12 of 18 overall with him at the helm. Though he might “rejoice in the fact that we made the playoffs,” Harbaugh sees Saturday’s 34-17 win over the Pittsburgh Steelers as a couple of boxes crossed off on the checklist of goals the Ravens have for their season.

But Saturday also marked a historic moment for Baltimore sports as a whole. While the Ravens have been perennial contenders since drafting Lamar Jackson in 2018, the Orioles spent six years hovering around the American League East basement before emerging from their rebuild to reach the playoffs each of the last two seasons.

The Ravens’ win Saturday ensured Baltimore’s football and baseball teams would reach the playoffs in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 1970 and 1971, when the Orioles and Colts each made the postseason, and only the second time overall.

“It means a lot,” Jackson said of the Ravens extending their season. “We been bustin’ our behind all season long, had ups and downs this whole season. But to clinch a playoff against a great team like that, that’s great. It means we’re moving in the right direction.”

That sentiment is permeable for both franchises. The Ravens are tied to Jackson and the Super Bowl-winning upside the two-time Most Valuable Player Award winner provides for at least the next three seasons. The Orioles have assembled one of baseball’s most enviable young cores centered around All-Stars Gunnar Henderson, Adley Rutschman and Jordan Westburg.

So far, neither team has been able to translate its regular season success into a championship. The Ravens have yet to make it past the AFC championship game with Jackson under center and the Orioles haven’t won a playoff game since 2014. For all the promise they’ve shown, players from both sides of Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard hope it’s only the beginning.

“We have a really good team,” Orioles first baseman Ryan Mountcastle said after the club was knocked out of the playoffs in October. “It shows in our record during the year. Unfortunately, the last two years, just haven’t been able to put it together in the playoffs. Hopefully, next year we can make it and try and make a run. That’s all you can do.”

The late 1960s and early ‘70s were a true golden era for Baltimore sports. The Orioles won two World Series and reached two more, anchored by Hall of Famers Brooks Robinson, Boog Powell, Frank Robinson and Jim Palmer. Colts quarterback Johnny Unitas, in the twilight of his Hall of Fame career, helped guide Baltimore to two Super Bowls in three years, winning it all in 1970.

Baltimore’s current teams have a long way to go before their era merits serious comparisons with the days of Brooks and Unitas. Yet fans are in the midst of what has been a rare period of local sports history with both teams fielding competitive rosters.

When the Orioles reached two World Series in five years from 1979 to 1983, the Colts were enduring the bulk of the six-year playoff drought that ultimately preceded the organization’s move to Indianapolis. The Ravens’ quick ascension to Super Bowl winners in 2000 under coach Brian Billick and early success with Harbaugh helped bridge the Orioles’ 14 straight October-less seasons.

That did culminate with a magical 2012 when the Ravens won the Super Bowl and the Orioles finally ended their skid with a 93-win campaign, but the Ravens hovered around .500 for the next five years while the Orioles made a couple of deep playoff runs that ended short of the Fall Classic. Only once have both teams won their division, and that came just last season.

However, it was that mid-2010s period of struggle that led to the Ravens landing Jackson. And the Orioles’ ensuing rebuild produced the stable of young talent that has them in position to contend in the American League East for the next half-decade. Where this era of Baltimore sports proves to stand among history is still unwritten, but the potential for fans to rejoice for the playoff success of both sides in 2025 is as great as it’s been in decades.

‘Tis the season.

Have a news tip? Contact Matt Weyrich at mweyrich@baltsun.com, 410-332-6200 and x.com/ByMattWeyrich.