Jaxson Dart admits to having national championship thoughts, stresses keeping focus

Ole Miss has made their way back into the field for the College Football Playoff. Still, Jaxson Dart says the Rebels, while knowing where they stand, aren’t getting ahead of themselves.

Dart discussed their national championship hopes while on ‘Andy & Ari On3’ on Thursday. He said that it is something that they’ve thought about, especially after beating Georgia two weekends ago and earning their standing in the playoff rankings.

“Yeah, I think so,” Dart said of if he had been wondering about winning it all lately.

“I think, you know, the momentum that we have after winning a game like that? Like, when you take down, you know, what we viewed as the top team in the whole country? It definitely gives your team some hope and confidence moving forward,” said Dart.

However, Ole Miss also knows what happens when their focus is there and not on their games each week. Dart thinks it led to their two losses that had them out of the bracket to begin with. Now, it’ll have to stay on their opponents, with two of them left, to avoid a third that would remove them from it for good this season.

“You know, you have those thoughts but, you know, the best thing that you can do is, honestly, just have the mindset of just trying to go 1-0 each and every week,” said Dart. “Especially with the 12-team playoff? I think that honestly got us hurt in the regular season of losing those two games. Like, I think that the games that we’ve lost? Our focus wasn’t solely on that one team and, at times, we wrapped our head around, you know, too much of the playoff and what the season could be. I think it really just grounded us and really humbled us, losing those games.”

As of the release of the third playoff rankings this week, Ole Miss was at No. 9 in the ratings. That made them the No. 10 seed in the projected bracket with them on the road in the first round.

Still, none of that or their national title aspirations if they have a third loss. That’s why Dart and Ole Miss are focused on Florida and Mississippi State in order to finish at 10-2 and make their way into the CFP.