New York Giants quarterback Jaxson Dart is giddy about Big Blue's future under new head coach John Harbaugh.
"I want to be a Super Bowl-winning quarterback and have that relationship with my head coach," Dart told Steve Serby of the New York Post in a phone interview. "I'm excited to go chase that and go make things happen with coach Harbaugh."
Dart was one reason Harbaugh chose the Giants as his next destination after 18 seasons with the Baltimore Ravens, viewing the second-year quarterback as a key to helping turn around a New York club that hasn't been past the Divisional Round of the playoffs since Tom Coughlin and Eli Manning won a Super Bowl together in 2011.
Dart spoke extensively with Harbaugh during the recruiting process and was part of the meetings with the coach during his sit-down interview on Jan. 14.
"He loves it. … He loves the way that I compete," Dart said. "There's a time and place for things, and I think that when you just watch my film, I got better at it throughout the entire season. As a rookie, I'm not gonna be perfect all the time in my decision-making, there's times where I'm gonna have to learn. But he's bought into the way that I play the game, he's bought into my skill set, and I can't wait for the team to see his vision when we get to have our first team meeting and to really just start taking our baby steps in developing as a team, getting back to winning and winning a lot of games."
In 18 seasons in Baltimore, Harbaugh went 180-133 in the regular season, and 13-11 in the playoffs, reaching the postseason in 12 of 18 seasons, including the 2012 Super Bowl run. The coach helped develop Joe Flacco and Lamar Jackson during his time with the Ravens. Those facts bode well for Dart, who went through a roller-coaster rookie campaign.
"Every single season, year in and year out, his teams compete at the highest level and then chase The Big One," Dart said, "and they have opportunity to, and so from a winning culture standpoint, I think that that's one that I knew before, that he instilled into his guys, into the organization, into the team that he coaches. And when you hear every player who talks about him and his love for his players and the buy-in that he gets, I think those were the things that really stood out before I even got the chance to meet him."
Dart believes the Giants, who finished fourth in the NFC East the past two seasons, can have a swift turnaround under Harbaugh.
"I think the message [to fans] is that we have our guy, we have our coach, we have a leader that's done it, who's competed, who's won at the highest level, and from a player's standpoint, he's gonna get the buy-in from us because we're starving to win," Dart said. "We're starving to have success, and we have the pieces, and we were close in a lot of games this year. I know coach Harbaugh's gonna be the guy that's gonna lead us and put us in the best situation to win each and every game that we play.
"We're gonna play fearless, we're gonna play physical, and we're gonna do our best to set a new standard."
