The Cincinnati Bengals’ offense showed considerable improvement from the season-opening clunker in Baltimore.

The Bengals defense? Not so much.

Surrendering more than 400 yards of total offense for the second consecutive week, the defense repeatedly was bailed out by quarterback Andy Dalton and his receivers making big plays to stay at least one score ahead of the Browns and hang on for a 34-27 victory Sunday before a sellout crowd of 63,036 at Paul Brown Stadium.

“Guys made big plays when we needed plays to be made, and that’s a step in the right direction,” Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis said after watching his team even its record at 1-1 and move into a first-place tie in the AFC North Division.

“Defensively we didn’t play well enough,” Lewis added. “We allowed some plays to get them back in the game in the fourth quarter.”

Browns rookie quarterback Brandon Weeden, fresh off a four-interception game in which he posted a 5.1 passer rating, threw for 322 yards and two touchdowns. Rookie running back Trent Richardson ran for 109 yards and a score and caught one of Weeden’s TD strikes to help gash the Bengals for 439 yards of offense six days after they allowed 430 in a 44-13 loss at Baltimore.

“It is alarming, but it’s not anything that’s going to hinder us,” Cincinnati linebacker Manny Lawson said. “Yeah, we gave up a lot of points, but we’ve got to keep on moving on.”

Fortunately for the Bengals, Dalton and the offense kept moving on every time the defense allowed another score.

Dalton completed 24-of-31 passes for 318 yards and three touchdowns for a career-best passer rating of 128.2. The Bengals were just 4-of-12 on third-down conversions, but two of them resulted in touchdowns — a 44-yarder to Brandon Tate that gave Cincinnati its first two-touchdown lead early in the third quarter, and a 50-yarder to Andrew Hawkins that bumped the lead back to 14 early in the fourth after Richardson’s 23-yard TD reception.

“We had to make some big plays today,” Dalton said. “We have the talent at receiver and the talent in the backfield, it just comes down to execution.”

Facing a Cleveland secondary that was missing starter Joe Haden (four-game drug suspension), Cincinnati had four receivers finish with at least 56 receiving yards for the first time since 1989 and ended up with with 375 yards of total offense.

A.J. Green had a game-high seven catches for 58 yards, including a 12-yard touchdown, Armon Binns added five receptions for 58 yards (both career highs), Tate hauled in three balls for 71 yards, and Hawkins caught two for 56 — including the electrifying 50-yard TD on a third-down scramble by Dalton.

“Since training camp we’ve had a good idea of what we think they can do,” offensive coordinator Jay Gruden said. “We didn’t really get a chance to show it last week, but this week they all had a chance to make plays. And they made them.”

Adam Jones also took advantage of his first chance to return a punt since Oct. 30, 2011, breaking off an 81-yarder for a touchdown to stake Cincinnati to a 7-0 lead less than two minutes into the game.

The Browns played catch-up the rest of the way. But they never got any closer than the final margin of seven points over the final 40 minutes of the game. They had a chance late, trailing by 10 with the ball at the Cincinnati 7-yard line in the final minute. But the Bengals held on third down, forced a field goal and recovered an onside kick to seal the win.

“It was a good start to the game, and a good finish,” Lewis said. “We came out and executed a lot of what we talked about. But there are also some things to build upon.”