Jacksonville faces a familiar foe in a new stadium as John Harbaugh leads a struggling Giants squad anchored by dynamic, yet injury-prone, young stars in East Rutherford.
The Jacksonville Jaguars have faced John Harbaugh several times over the years.
The series has been pretty even, with Harbaugh’s Ravens winning five of the nine matchups.
Now, Jacksonville looks to move to .500 against Harbaugh and will look to do it with Harbaugh running a different team.
When the Ravens decided to fire Harbaugh after 18 seasons, most knew that he wouldn’t be out of a job for long. They ended up being right. Just over a week after the Ravens fired him, the New York Giants hired him, making him their 24th head coach in more than 100 years as a franchise. One of the league’s oldest and proudest organizations has fallen on hard times. Since making a run to the divisional playoffs in 2022, the Giants are 13-38, and 7-27 over the past two years.
Things were so bad last year that head coach Brian Daboll didn’t last the whole way, being fired after 10 games.
Mike Kafka took over on an interim basis for the rest of the season, and the Giants went 2-5 to finish 4-13, the fifth-worst record in the league.
Now, Harbaugh is here, and to break through in a competitive NFC East, he’s going to need talent.
That starts at the quarterback position. Jaxson Dart wasn’t supposed to be New York’s starter as a rookie in 2025. But with the team at 0-3 and going nowhere, Daboll benched veteran starter Russell Wilson and gave the kid a shot. The results were better than some might expect from the starter on a team that finished 4-13. Dart ended his rookie year with 15 touchdowns and five interceptions, completing almost 64% of his passes.
Dart gave Giants fans plenty to be encouraged about last year, but also gave them some things to worry about, with the main one being his health.
Before his 23rd birthday, Dart had already developed a reputation for reckless play.
Regardless of whether that reputation is justified or not, it’s a fact that Dart missed two games late in the year while in concussion protocol.
If Dart can’t stay healthy, this year’s Giants might not be much better than last year’s regardless of the coaching switch.
The same goes for fellow 2025 draftee Cam Skattebo, whose season ended in Week 8. He ended his rookie year with 410 yards and five touchdowns on 101 carries.
Jags-Giants is scheduled for 1:00 on CBS from the Meadowlands.
