Marist Red Foxes 2026 Season Preview

Willis Faces a Flat Trajectory

Mike Willis closed 2025 at 5-7 and 3-5 in Pioneer play, a middling stretch that mirrors the No. 91 power rating attached to this roster. Nothing in that ledger points to a program pulling away from the league pack, just a team that split its conference slate and finished on the wrong side of .500. The 2026 task is turning close, split results into the kind of separation that number simply has not shown yet.

Efficiency Problem, Not a Talent One

Sonny Mannino comes back after throwing for 1,771 yards and 11 touchdowns against just 3 picks, which makes the offense's collapse on third down (29.2%, 116th) the real puzzle heading into 2026. Marist moved the ball with real explosiveness (36th nationally) but couldn't sustain drives, and until that third-down rate climbs, this stays a defense-carries-the-team outfit. That defense is legitimate, ranking 19th in yards per play allowed and forcing the field into staying on schedule at just a 39.4% clip, and a +5 turnover margin gave Mannino short fields he still has to finish off in 2026.

Sonny Mannino threw for 1,771 yards and 11 touchdowns against just 3 interceptions last year, and he heads into 2026 as the unquestioned starter behind an offense that stalled on third downs at a 29.2% clip, 116th nationally. That efficiency problem, not the quarterback spot, is the real issue for Mike Willis to fix, since Mannino's low pick total and a 36th-ranked explosiveness mark show he can create big plays when the line gives him room. Will O'Dell and Patrick Grusser return with spot duty in relief, but this offense goes only as far as Mannino can drag a 22.7-point scoring attack that too often stalls short of the sticks.

Carter James topped Marist backs with 360 yards and 4 scores last fall, but Tristan Shannon's 481 yards and 4 touchdowns walk out the door, and there is no single returner who ran for even half that total. Ja'Cyion Cox managed just 89 yards and Kenneth Antoine 41, so James inherits the early-down job by default rather than by having beaten anyone out. Jeremy DeCaro's 30 grabs give Mike Willis a pass-catching option out of the backfield, but with the offense already sitting 87th in rushing yards per game, this group needs James to scale up fast or Marist stays stuck in the middle of a bad national rushing pack.

Lance Martinez is the one proven weapon in this room, having turned 29 catches into 575 yards and 4 touchdowns, and with Reed Shumpert's 34 grabs now gone, Marist is leaning even harder on him to be the guy defenses account for. Santino Correa flashed with a touchdown on just 4 catches and Jack Melore adds a possession target off 15 catches, but neither has shown he can absorb the volume Shumpert took with him. That thin proven-production picture lines up with an offense that ranked 116th in third-down rate and 102nd in success rate a year ago, so unless Jake Ciolino, Chris Gioia or Shamar Jenkins turns unknown potential into real snaps, Martinez is still doing this largely on his own in 2026.

Connor Hulstein's 42 catches, 599 yards and 7 touchdowns walk out the door, and nothing in this room replaces that kind of production on paper. Jackson Conners-McCarthy is the incumbent with real snaps, 14 catches for 78 yards, but that is a possession role, not a red-zone threat, and Joey Bemis and Brody Eaton combined for just three catches. Marist's passing game was already middling (200 yards per game, 72nd), so unless Conners-McCarthy expands his target share fast, this offense loses its most explosive weapon at the position.

Jacob Bentley, Hudson Dalton, Carson DeRoner, Jake Fabian and Brandon Furey headline a front that has to answer for a 29.2% third-down conversion rate and a 36.2% success rate, numbers that explain why Marist stalled out at 22.7 points per game in 2025. The departures of Will Aaronson, Masin Cobb and Dominic Perricone strip away experience without any record of who actually anchored last year's line, so Mike Willis is piecing together an identity up front rather than banking on continuity. The explosiveness mark of 1.34, 36th nationally, shows this offense can hit chunk plays when it gets rolling; the line's job in 2026 is turning that into more manageable third downs.

Marist's front held up better than the scoreboard suggested last season, checking in 19th nationally in yards per play allowed even as the defense gave up 341 yards a game. Eddie Bowen, Jordan Caldwell, Jalen Carpenter, Dixon Charzuk, Matt DeFeo and Sam English are all back to build on that, with Nick Bilsbury and Sean Coverdale the only losses up front. That continuity matters most on the ground, where the line has to push the rushing defense past 43rd nationally and turn a serviceable per-play number into fewer sustained drives for opponents.

Six linebackers are back for Mike Willis, a group led by Rene Barber, Jared Bernabei, Matt Bonczek, Nate Furrow, Dylan Gilmore and James Kratochvil, none with a statistical track record on the books yet despite the volume of returning bodies. That continuity matters because this defense was middling against the run in 2025, giving up 139 yards per game on the ground (43rd) while holding up better on a per-play basis (5.18 yards per play, 19th). Garrett Carter's departure removes the only outgoing piece at the position, so 2026 is essentially a chance for this returning core to turn shared reps into a proven answer up front.

Wayne Adair, Zach Cameron and Conor Fitzgibbon all return at safety, and Trevion Adcox, Nathaniel Banton and Suraj Fong all return at corner, giving Marist an entire back end intact from a defense that ranked 19th nationally in yards per play allowed and held opponents on schedule at just a 39.4% clip. That efficiency masked a group that still bled 341 yards and 23.5 points per game, so Mike Willis has last year's exact personnel back to prove those explosive-play numbers were the real story and the counting stats were the fluke, not the other way around. With Broox Bolden, Lamont Narcisse, Rechee Smith, Larmar Frazier and Kade Werner all gone, continuity itself is the bet here, six familiar names asked to turn a good rate stat into a good defense.

Samer Layous is gone after connecting on 8 of 10 field goals and 54 points, and Mike Willis has two names to sort out in his place: Connor Mendini and Ryan Scribner, neither with a kick on record yet. The punting picture is just as blank, with Luke Ginsburg and Josh McColl both unproven, while Bode Ganny and Aidan McElderry give the long-snapper spot actual continuity. For a team that went 3-5 in Pioneer play, replacing Layous cleanly matters more than the record alone suggests.

Sonny Mannino's Progression

Mannino threw for 1771 yards and 11 touchdowns last fall but also tossed 3 interceptions and now loses Connor Hulstein, the 42-catch, 599-yard security blanket who bailed him out in traffic. With Lance Martinez back outside and no portal help arriving to offset that loss, Mannino has to spread targets to Martinez and Carter James himself and clean up his decision-making, or Marist's offense stalls right where it did in a 3-5 conference finish.

Covering Even While Losing

Marist finished 5-7 straight up but 8-4 against the spread, the clearest sign that Mike Willis's team was never as bad as its record. Home is where the number pays off: a 5-1 cover mark and a perfect 2-0 as a home favorite, even while going just 4-2 straight up there. The road is the flip side, a 1-5 straight-up mark that still produced a 3-3 cover and a 60% clip as an underdog, meaning bettors keep getting a fair price on a team that competes even when it loses.