The Ravens’ 2012 season began with a Joe Flacco 52-yard laser-beam pass into the arms of his speedy receiver Torrey Smith on the first play Monday night.
The question now is this: Where will it end?
That Flacco pass, merely the appetizer in the 44-13 shellacking Baltimore laid on the Bengals, set a tone — for the game and, the Ravens hope, for their season.
The next game is today in Philadelphia, where Ravens coach John Harbaugh once was an assistant coach.
The Ravens already possess one of the top defenses in the NFL, led by veterans Ray Lewis and Ed Reed.
They were a 32-yard missed field goal by kicker Billy Cundiff with 11 seconds remaining of the 23-20 AFC Championship loss in New England away from possibly playing in the Super Bowl.
As much as it was easy to place all the blame on Cundiff for the missed field goal, the Ravens lost that game as much for their inability to generate enough offense against the Patriots’ defense. That was highlighted by a dropped potential game-winning TD pass in the end zone by Lee Evans moments before the fateful missed kick.
Now, with Flacco — aided by former Colts head coach Jim Caldwell, who now is the Ravens’ quarterbacks coach — seemingly having matured into a championship-caliber quarterback, and with strong pieces around him in running back Ray Rice, a solid offensive line and speedy receivers, is it the Ravens’ turn to win the Super Bowl?
In Lewis’ 17 NFL seasons, the Ravens offense has ranked 16th in the league on average in total points, and it has been more than a decade since they ranked better than 15th in total yards for a season. The defense, meanwhile, has been ranked in the top three in points allowed in five of the past six seasons.
If the defense remains as good as it has been for the last several years, the offense appears to have the proper parts to make a title run.
Flacco looked sharp last week running the no-huddle, going 21-of-29 for 299 yards, two TDs and no INTs while spreading the ball to eighth different receivers.
“It’s a team now. It’s a full team,” Reed told Baltimore reporters last week. “It’s something this organization has been building toward for a long time.”
Harbaugh said the Week 1 offensive output was “probably what we expected.”
“That’s what we looked like in practice,” he said. “That’s what we thought we could be in games. But it is just one game.”
If the Ravens’ offense continues to look the way it did Monday, the AFC playoffs might have to go through Baltimore.
mark.cannizzaro@nypost.com