Pat Fitzgerald remembers recruiting Mike Kafka as a junior at St. Rita of Cascia High School on Chicago’s Southwest Side, noticing an unselfish willingness to play wide receiver to accommodate a senior who clearly was not as good a quarterback. 

Fitzgerald, then an assistant coach at Northwestern, was still on the scouting trail the following spring when he watched Kafka play baseball. He witnessed Kafka scoop up a ball deep in the right-field corner, spin and fire a one-hop throw to nail the baserunner trying to stretch a double into a triple. 

“I called back to our recruiting office and said, ‘The Kafka kid’s got a hose,’ ’’ Fitzgerald said, laughing at the memory. 

Those are happy reminiscences for Fitzgerald, who oversaw Kafka’s development as a quarterback at Northwestern, gave Kafka his start in coaching, marveled at Kafka’s advancement as an NFL assistant in Kansas City and now awaits Kafka’s debut as the new offensive coordinator for the Giants. 

That is all precursor to what might be inevitable for the 34-year-old Kafka, if his stay with the Giants is auspicious: A head-coaching gig of his own, sometime down the road. 

“Absolutely, there’s no question in my mind,’’ Fitzgerald, Northwestern’s head coach since 2006, told The Post on Friday. “First of all, he’s a Northwestern man, so he’s incredibly bright. He was unbelievably dedicated and just a relentless football player. He played at a high level and knows what it takes to get there so he’s experienced what the players will have experienced. 

“And he was willing to grind. He came here, he went into a kind of a non-coaching role with the Chiefs and to see the way he’s grown up in this profession, I think he’s a superstar. I think he’s gonna do a great job there with the Giants and then the sky’s the limit for Mike. If it’s being the head coach here I hope he gives me a few more years.’’ 

First things first. Kafka isn’t returning to his alma mater to supplant Fitzgerald or getting an NFL head coaching job just yet. He was hired by Brian Daboll, the first-year Giants head coach, despite not having any previous connection to Daboll. Kafka’s task is enormous: Fix the broken Giants offense, help Daniel Jones become a winning NFL quarterback and call all the plays on offense, if Daboll asks him to do so. 

“I will tell you this, the New York football Giants are gonna get a terrific person who is going to grind and do everything he can to help that organization win and I think just embodies what New York and Chicago are all about,’’ Fitzgerald said. 

The Fitzgerald-Kafka union was beneficial for coach and player. Kafka’s five-year college playing career ended with a flourish, and a passing orgy. To cap the 2009 season, he completed 47 of 78 passes for 532 yards, five touchdowns (plus one rushing TD) and four interceptions, breaking all sorts of Outback Bowl records in a 38-35 overtime loss to Auburn. 

Kafka was a 2010 fourth-round draft pick of the Eagles and he embarked on his nomadic NFL career under the care of Andy Reid. Kafka lasted only two years with the Eagles, then hit the training camp and offseason roster circuit with the Patriots, Jaguars, Buccaneers, Vikings, Titans and Bengals. His official NFL ledger: Four games (all with the Eagles in 2011), 11 completions in 16 pass attempts, no touchdowns, two interceptions. There was limited action on the field, but Kafka did not waste a minute of his six years bouncing around the league, as far as setting himself up for what came next. 

“To begin with, even as a player, you’re a backup quarterback, you’re always coaching behind the scenes and helping guys who are the starters out there,” Kafka told the Giants’ website. “It felt easy to me. It felt comfortable.’’ 

It was oh-so-comfortable for Fitzgerald to welcome Kafka back to Evanston in 2016 as an offensive graduate assistant. 

“It was a no-brainer, right?’’ Fitzgerald said. “He was playing in the league and he and I had stayed in touch, every offseason as it got towards the end of his career, I just kept putting that bug in his ear and everything just worked itself out. I kinda had a pipeline where you start as a volunteer and work your way into getting on the field, but when it was Mike, he skipped everybody else in line.’’ 

After only one year back on campus, Kafka left the college game behind. He made such a positive impression on Reid the first time around that Reid, in 2017, hired Kafka as the Chiefs’ offensive quality control coach. 

“I think he’s wired right,’’ Reid said at the time. 

Reid entrusted Kafka to work directly with Patrick Mahomes, a rookie who was then sitting and learning behind starter Alex Smith. 

“Mike was [Mahomes’] personal coach,’’ Reid said. “He did everything with him.’’ 

A year later, Kafka was promoted to quarterbacks coach, the direct conduit to Mahomes, a first-time NFL starter. By the end of their second season together Mahomes had thrown 50 touchdown passes and been named the league’s Most Valuable Player. 

Two years ago, Reid added “passing game coordinator’’ to Kafka’s job description. Mahomes is an uncommon talent, but that does not mean he is impervious to lapses. He needs coaching and he credits Kafka for helping in the evolution of his pocket presence. 

“I’ve just continued to work on the fundamentals,’’ Mahomes said late last season. “Coach Kafka has really kind of ingrained that in me and I think I’ve gotten better as of late because of that. Trying to figure out that right balance of when to scramble and run and do that stuff and when to stay in the pocket and make the throw is something I’ll always work on.’’ 

Kafka can bring all the insight he gleaned from Reid with him to the Giants, but he must leave Mahomes behind. Kafka’s pupil now is Jones, entering the final year of his contract. The Chiefs were a thrill-a-minute offense with Reid calling the shots. The Giants, in 2021, with Jones, and then Mike Glennon and Jake Fromm, were last in the NFL in generating plays on offense of 20 or more yards. 

“Big picture-wise, you always think about generating those explosive plays,” Kafka said. “The Kansas City offense, they’re going to throw it deep. We’re going to do those types of things downfield. I think that’s important to understand and that has to be an element of your offense. 

“Now, we’ve got to take a step back and make sure it fits for our personnel, fits for the quarterback, fits for our offensive line, but I think you want to be able to find ways to generate explosive plays, especially this day in age in the NFL.” 

Kafka has never called plays on any level. That did not deter Fitzgerald, who said he wanted to bring Kafka back to Northwestern as the offensive coordinator. The Giants got him first. 

“First of all, Mike’s a terrific human being, he’s got a great demeanor, he’s a great family man, he’s incredibly intelligent, he’s just got a relentless work ethic to him, an incredibly high football IQ and he’s got a real unselfish nature about him,’’ Fitzgerald said. “What he’s been able to accomplish with the tutoring and development of Patrick Mahomes, that’s got to get everybody in New York excited.’’ 

Getting everyone excited in the offseason is fine. Kafka’s greatest challenge will be to find a way to generate that excitement with the offense throughout his first season with the Giants. That will make him a superstar coordinator.