DaytonDailyNews.com

CLEVELAND — Thousands of Browns fans, eager for their first glimpse of rookie quarterback Brady Quinn, hung around Saturday night when otherwise they would have had no reason.

And the first-round draft choice from Notre Dame treated the diehards to two touchdown passes deep in the fourth quarter of an otherwise dismal 23-20 preseason loss to the Detroit Lions in Cleveland Browns Stadium.

Quinn could not save the day despite completing 13-of-20 passes for 155 yards. It was too far gone, largely due to the play of the veteran quarterbacks ahead of him. But he did complete his first five passes, leading the Browns from their 37-yard line to the Lions' 4. After an incompletion, he rolled right and tossed a TD pass to Efrem Hill with 6:39 remaining.

Then he capped a 13-play drive with a 6-yard TD pass to Jerome Harrison with 18 seconds left.

Sure, many Lions on the field during Quinn's exposure soon will embark on other careers and the coverage was rather loose, but the crowd unapologetically seized the moment, painfully aware of how much had gone wrong earlier.

Detroit led 16-0 at halftime and 23-0 early in the fourth quarter.

On the game's first play, Lions defensive end Jared DeVries collapsed the right side of the Browns' line and knocked the ball out of quarterback Derek Anderson's hands. A field goal resulted from the turnover.

Regrouping, Anderson then marched the Browns from their 36-yard line to first-and-goal at the Detroit 1. But the comedy was just beginning.

After a delay-of-game penalty, the second of two confusion time-outs, a Seth McKinney false start and a 4-yard run by Jamal Lewis, it was second-and-goal from the 2 when Lions linebacker Ernie Sims intercepted Anderson over the middle.

"I'm disappointed," Browns coach Romeo Crennel said. "We started off with a turnover and made mistakes in the red zone. Those are mistakes a good team doesn't make, and we made them."

Just before halftime, Charlie Frye, who relieved Anderson, threw an interception that led to a field goal.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2408 or smcclelland@DaytonDailyNews.com.