Coach John Harbaugh sits down with Giants.com for a weekly conversation about the latest at 1925 Giants Drive.

Q: I figured we'd start with January 8th, 2024. Do you remember where you were that night?  I'll give you a hint. It's where you will be this Sunday and J.J. McCarthy was also there on that date.

Harbaugh: Houston. National championship.

Q: I say this as an Ohio State grad. I didn't watch a second of that game, but it comes full circle this week. What do you remember from that night? I read you had some travel delays.

Harbaugh: We had a plane and we were coming in. I had (Ravens executive vice president) Ozzie (Newsome) and (executive vice president and general manager) Eric DeCosta and our wives and we were flying in and there were storms all around Houston, so nobody could get into Houston. All the planes were being diverted and so it took us forever. Then they said we're going to have to land in Austin. So we land in Austin, and there's a bunch of planes trying to get to the game. So we go in and our pilot is trying to work it out, work it out, work it out, and calling. And so they said, "OK, we've got a five-minute window. Do you want to go? If you want to go, we're going to basically fly between two storms into this airport. The car is waiting for us there. We've got to go right now." We're like, "All right, let's go." He told us 15 minutes before that we're not going be able to do it. So we were planning to go to a sports bar and watch the game on TV in Austin. So, when he said there is a window, we said, let's go. So we fly in and it is the worst landing ever. We are coming in like – the storm is blowing us around, and I'm just looking at Ozzie. And (my wife) Ingrid even says to me, she goes, "Well, this is a heck of a way to go." The plane gets on the ground, cars come up with a police escort to the stadium. They drop us off. There's security everywhere. Security runs us in. People are like, "Who are these guys?" It was probably the end of the first quarter, start of the second quarter, so we're late for the game. They said, "Where do you want to go?" Let's go down to the field. So we go down to the field and we're standing there and as soon as we get there, the drive was coming our way and the Michigan cheerleaders are right in front of us. We're just kind of standing there and all of a sudden there was a TV timeout and Jim comes walking over. We see him right there and he kind of bends over and I said to Ozzie or Eric, "What do you think?" So I go running up and I go, "Hey!" He said, "Oh!" He had no idea. We had quite an adventure getting there.

Q: What do you remember hearing about J.J. from your brother?

Harbaugh: I remember when they recruited him. He was one of the top recruits in the country. He was up there and they were recruiting him for a number of years and they got him and then in the first year he kind of backed up but he played a little bit. Jim made him a starter at some point and I just watched him play a lot. I knew Jim loved him – leadership, energy, et cetera, all the stuff you see. And that's really all I knew. I didn't know much more than that. I never really got to know him or anything. I wasn't around their program enough to get to know him, but I just knew how Jim (felt about him). And also Jack, Jim's son, idolized J.J. Like got the same haircut. He'd be dressed the same way. Did the whole thing. He was like a little J.J. McCarthy.

Q: A lot of times we see quarterback changes made at the bye week, which is coming up. But if something is inevitable, is it best to do it as soon as possible because now you get this week too?

Harbaugh: I just never thought of it that way. I never considered whether the bye week is coming up and that'd be a better time. To be honest with you, it never even crossed my mind. I'm just thinking about what was the best thing for the next game and was he ready. It really wasn't all that. I mean, it's good to think about. Now that people have brought it up, I'm like, I didn't really care about that.

Q: What does a win going into the break do for a team?

Harbaugh: It makes the bye week a lot better, a lot more fun, that's for sure. When you lose (going into) the bye week, you've got to live with it, which kind of sucks. But for us, it means we'd be two games over .500. It would set us up for the two really huge division games coming up. It would give us a chance to take total control of the division. Those are opportunities for us, but to step back from all that, it really doesn't matter. It's about this game.

Q: You have coached against DeMeco Ryans when he was a player and a head coach. What do you remember from his playing days?

Harbaugh: I would say that his defenses reflect the way he played. That's the best compliment I could give him. He played the same way. Obviously he does a great job with those guys.

Q: You mentioned yesterday his defense plays "ahead of plays." Can you expand on that?

Harbaugh: For instance, like say you run some kind of a curl-flat route for instance. Well, there's usually a guy sitting on the curl and there's usually a guy on top of the flat route. They don't usually play a step behind plays. They're not chasing plays too often. It seems like they're set up where they need to be, which is a sign obviously, a reflection of a very well-coached defense.

Q: What player on the team right now would make a good coach?

Harbaugh: I think Jameis (Winston) would be a great coach.

Q: He would certainly be motivational.

Harbaugh: Yeah, he'd be great. And he's got a really good head for the game. There's a couple of guys. Guys that jump out at you would be like (Jevón) Holland. I think he'd be phenomenal as a coach.

Q: Why's that?

Harbaugh: He's smart, super smart, great conceptual thinker. He can put a lot of different ideas together. He's got a nice demeanor and personality. Yeah, I think he'd be a great coach. There's others. (Isaiah) Likely, I think, could be a great coach.

Q: For an 18-year period in Baltimore, nobody in the NFL ran it more than you and nobody had more rushing yards than you. You've seen it all. I'm sure you've gone through stretches where you haven't been happy with the run game like now. From your experience, how do you get through it? Do you have to run your way through it?

Harbaugh: Yeah, we'll get there. We'll definitely get there. You kind of know whatever the things are that are holding you back. You've just got to kind of keep working on them and it's always going to be important, so you've got to get there. And it's not like we have to be a running team. There were a lot of years where we weren't, you know, that we were throwing. Lamar (Jackson) threw for a bunch of yards a couple of years ago and then back with (Joe) Flacco, but I just think the ability to do everything well is really important because if not, you become one-dimensional. It's just hard to be good enough one-dimensionally if that's what you are. You've got to be able to keep people off balance a little bit or they're going to be waiting on your plays, kind of what we talked about before. Then obviously if you can't run, then you become one-dimensional in a lot of ways because all you really have is drop-back pass. And that's, you've got to be so good at it, ridiculously good at it, to move the ball if you don't have that.

Q: A theme of the week has been new starts. J.J. gets a new start. Jameis talked about how important that was in his career, too. We're getting to the midway point of your first season here. Have you had a chance to reflect on your new start?

Harbaugh: I would say yes and no. No, because you're so wrapped up in the challenge. Yes, because how could you not? In moments maybe when I'm doing morning devotional or something, try to put things in perspective and how special it is to be doing something like this and with the guys and just all the things that are meaningful in life. You do think about it. You have to, especially when you get old like me.

Q: Was Andy Reid right? Change can be good.

Harbaugh: Oh sure, of course, he was absolutely right. Change can be great.

Q: J.J. mentioned this yesterday. He gets dropped into this situation and he said he could feel "the culture of just grinding every single day." He also mentioned the makeshift locker room. I know back in the summer you said half-jokingly that the renovations could make you a grittier team. Has there been any truth to that?

Harbaugh: That's a great question. I don't know. I mean, who could say? Who could say? The organization has done a great job. It's much upgraded thanks to our owners. The guys are pretty happy with it. But early on, it was kind of tough. Maybe that's part of it. Who knows?

Q: The Athletic put out a great feature that went behind the scenes of what goes on in an NFL headset. It's stuff that you probably don't think twice about, but it interests a lot of people like me on the outside. The classic image is the head coach on the headset and we see you all talking…

Harbaugh (quoting the mound visit scene in Bull Durham): "Candlesticks always make a nice gift."

Q: What's your approach to the whole sideline communication?

Harbaugh: It can't be everyone going back and forth, but there's got to be an opening for everybody to be involved. And there's different levels of it too because there's the channel that I'm on and then I'm on one of offense, defense, special teams. There's actually four, game management (being the other). But I can click in when I want and they have two channels in each of those areas, so they can be talking to a channel I can't get to. That's where they'll have more of their like strategy kind of conversation. "Hey, what front are they in? What are they doing?" I'll hear that on my line too, and sometimes like between series, I have to choose which conversation I want to be involved with just either to listen or to give input, like next series thoughts or what's going on or why did that happen kind of conversation. But really more than that, like for the head coach, you've got be involved in the action, the actual what's going on on the field right then because you might need to take a delay or call a timeout or just know what the play call is or every now and then just let them know, hey, we should run it here, be careful, whatever you might throw in there. Or just, hey, on fourth down we're thinking one, we're thinking one and two, we're thinking punt no matter what, whatever it would be once we kind of make those decisions with game management. But so much of it is just listening just so that you know what's going on, where we're at, just so you've got a handle on the whole game. I think that's a big part of it too. And so you're flicking, flicking back from offense to defense, jump over to special teams and ask (assistant head coach/special teams coordinator) Chris (Horton) something, like why did the kickoff return leak out?

Q: Lastly, who are the game captains this week?

Harbaugh: DJ (Reader) on defense, Huddy (Bryan Hudson) on offense and Malik Harrison on special teams.