Ravens 24, Titans 10

Monday, January 8th 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) â€” Brian Billick and his Baltimore Ravens may not like the Tennessee Titans. But they're not above following the Titans' example from last season â€” going on the road as a wild-card team to get to the Super Bowl.

``When you go into the lion's den, you don't tiptoe in. You go in screaming like a banshee,'' Billick said after the Ravens upset the Titans 24-10 Sunday despite getting just 134 yards of offense and having the ball less than 20 minutes.

In a way it was typical of this Baltimore team, which goes to Oakland next Sunday to play for a shot at representing the AFC in the Super Bowl. This is, after all, a team that didn't score a touchdown in five games in October but somehow managed to win two of them because it has the NFL's stingiest defense.

It was the leader of that defense, Ray Lewis, who did the job Sunday.

Lewis, the league's defensive player of the year, not only led the Ravens with 12 tackles, but got his first career touchdown, grabbing the ball away from Eddie George and racing 50 yards for the score that put the Titans ahead by two TDs.

That came about five minutes after Keith Washington, who has been bouncing around the NFL for six seasons, blocked his second field goal of the game. It popped in the air to Anthony Mitchell, a third-string safety and former NFL Europe player, who took it 90 yards untouched to break a 10-10 tie and give the Ravens (14-4), their ninth straight win.

``I can't get over what a good football team this is,'' said quarterback Trent Dilfer, whose arrival as the starter coincides with the streak.

``We just continue to find ways to get the job done and pride ourselves on it. If somebody needs to step up to make a play, they do.''

Dilfer had an awful day statistically: 5-of-16 for 117 yards. But 56 of those yards came in the second quarter on a pass to a wide-open Shannon Sharpe, who took the ball to the 1. Jamal Lewis took it in to tie it 7-all.

But two Titans had worse days.

One was Dainon Sidney, who got 40 yards in penalties on special teams during the game's most critical period.

One, interference with a fair catch, gave the Ravens 15 yards they needed to set up Matt Stover's field goal that tied the game at 10-all. The other two put the Titans in bad field position, which helped lead to the two fourth-quarter scores.

The other was Al Del Greco, one of the most reliable kickers in NFL history.

On Sunday, he had two attempts blocked by Washington and hit the left upright with a 31-yard attempt just before the half.

Del Greco's worst previous day was also against Baltimore â€” he missed an extra point and potential game-winning field goal in a 24-23 loss to the Ravens, the only visitor ever to win at Adelphia Coliseum, where the Titans are 16-2 in two seasons.

``Losing is tough to swallow, no matter how,'' Del Greco said. ``To have the kind of day I had, missing three in a game and have it come out like this is not like you would ever expect it to happen. I wish I could change it. But the way it comes out is the way it comes out.

It's been a strange year.''

He's right about that.

This is the first time since after the 1989 season that the franchise â€” then the Cleveland Browns â€” reached the AFC title game. It lost to Denver that season, as it did in two heartbreaking losses to John Elway and the Broncos after the 1986 and '87 seasons.

It also puts Art Modell, the Ravens' owner, in position to get to his first Super Bowl after owning the team for 40 years. And it pits Modell, one of the NFL's establishments until he moved the team from Cleveland five years ago, against Al Davis, the league's quintessential maverick.

And most of it was the work of another outsider â€” Lewis, who was on trial last spring on murder charges involving the stabbing of two men outside a party after the Super Bowl in Atlanta a year ago. Lewis ended up pleading guilty to lesser charges of hampering an investigation.

The constant attention has irritated Billick.

``The man's done everything he could,'' Billick said. ``The man was convicted of nothing worth this constant asterisk Ray Lewis MVP, slash, yadda, yadda, yadda. AFC championship game participant, yadda, yadda, yadda.

``I know I'm howling at the moon here, because it's probably asking too much. ... For us, it's an absolute non-issue.''

It's certainly a non-issue in their quest to get to the Super Bowl.

Particularly since if they get there, Ray Lewis will take them.