game. It was a wonderful victory.”

It’s probably best to start at the beginning.

Wide receiver Derius Davis set up the first of quarterback Justin Herbert’s two touchdown passes with a 53-yard punt return, giving the Chargers a first down at the Browns’ 30-yard line with 10:33 left in the first quarter. Davis sat out the past three games because of a hamstring injury.

Herbert completed 14 of 16 passes for 250 yards and TD passes of 27 yards to Joshua Palmer and 66 yards to Quentin Johnston for a perfect passer rating of 158.3 in the first half. Herbert was sacked six times in the first half, including three by the Browns’ menacing Myles Garrett.

“My gosh, he is so good,” Harbaugh said of Garrett.

Johnston caught four passes for a career-best 118 yards, topping his previous best of 91 yards set last year as a rookie. Palmer caught two passes for 63 yards and rookie Ladd McConkey had a team-leading five receptions for 64 yards, one week after he had a career-best 111 yards on six catches.

Running back J.K. Dobbins scored on runs of 16 and 7 yards, his third career game with two or more touchdowns. He set up his second touchdown with a 34-yard gain to the Browns’ 7 in the closing moments of a game in which the Chargers were never in serious jeopardy.

“This Browns defense, they stop plays,” Harbaugh said. “They stop them cold. You saw the sacks, the tackles for losses. They’re really good at it. Unless you don’t get discouraged and you keep a good self worth of yourself, and 3, 2, 1, let it go, the next play is coming. I thought our guys did a really good job of that.”

The Chargers offense was only half of the story, though.

When the Chargers offense stopped clicking in the second half, after building a 20-3 lead by halftime, their defense took over the game. The Chargers intercepted Browns quarterback Jameis Winston three times in the second half and conceded only a last-minute touchdown pass to Cedric Tillman.

Elijah Molden, Alohi Gilman and Tarheeb Still had interceptions for the Chargers, who have given up a minuscule average of 12.6 points per game, the best in the NFL through nine weeks. The Chargers’ bend-but-don’t-break defense more than made up for a malfunctioning offense during the second half.

Molden’s interception was his third this season; Gilman and Still got their first.

The Chargers also limited Browns running back Nick Chubb to 39 yards on 15 carries. Winston completed 26 of 46 passes for 235 yards with one touchdown and three interceptions. The Chargers sacked Winston six times, including 2 1/2 by Tuli Tuipulotu and two by Morgan Fox.

After the game, Chargers edge rusher Khalil Mack chided Fox in the locker room for missing Winston at one point and failing to get a third sack.

“Three piece and you let it go?” Mack said, laughing. “Nah, man, excellent job by these guys. They’ve been working hard all week and it’s great when you can see it pay off. We talked about that this week, just what we wanted to do statistically against the run. We knew the challenge was going to be to stop (Chubb) this week.

“Another challenge we answered.”

And?

“Create turnovers, knowing Jameis was going to give us some opportunities to get the ball,” Mack said, continuing his postgame assessment of all that went the Chargers’ way defensively. “Everybody hit on every cylinder. It was great to see, man. Total team defense. Kind of domination today.”