Pennsylvania Quakers 2026 Season Preview

Steady Ground for Santos

Rick Santos closed 2025 at 6-4 overall and 4-3 in Ivy play, the kind of season that buys a program calm rather than drama. Penn sits at No. 50 nationally in power rating, a neutral marker that matches a roster which was competitive week to week without a signature breakthrough. Nothing in the 2026 picture points to upheaval, just a program building on a winning year under the same staff.

Olsen Inherits a Precise Offense

Penn's offense won on efficiency in 2025, not chunk plays, ranking 2nd nationally in third-down conversion and 12th in success rate while sitting at just 92nd in explosiveness. Cadin Olsen, who caught 3 passes for 29 yards and a touchdown last fall, projects as the quarterback tasked with keeping that formula intact rather than turning it into a big-play attack. The bigger question is defense, where 238 passing yards allowed per game (87th) undercuts a run defense (138 yards allowed, 41st) that otherwise held up.

Liam O'Brien's 2,376 passing yards walk out the door, and Cadin Olsen is the front-runner to replace him, taking the first-team reps this camp after catching three passes for 29 yards and a touchdown a year ago rather than throwing them. That thin resume as a passer is exactly why the race is not settled, with Karson Siqueiros-Lasky, Jack Grusser, Michael Malone and Shane Throgmartin still in the mix behind him. Whoever wins the job inherits an offense that ranked 29th in passing yards per game and 2nd in third-down conversion rate, but one that generated its explosive plays 92nd nationally, so Penn needs its new starter to at least sustain the efficiency Rick Santos built around O'Brien, not just flash big plays.

Donte West's 417 yards and 5 scores anchor a backfield that has to carry more weight after Julien Stokes' 225 yards walked out the door. Sean Williams Jr. (215 yards, 2 TD) gives Rick Santos a legitimate 1-2 punch, but the bigger issue is what happens after contact: Penn's ground game ranked just 76th in rushing yards per game and 92nd in explosiveness, meaning West and Williams are grinding out a run game that rarely breaks. With Tommy Lafayette showing up mostly as a passing-game piece and EJ Carter Jr. unproven, the Quakers' offense stays tilted toward the 239-yard-per-game passing attack that ranked 29th, while the backfield's job is less about explosiveness than sustaining the drives that made Penn 2nd nationally on third down.

Bisi Owens took 66 catches and 696 yards out the door, and with Davis Ellis and Alex Haight also gone, Pennsylvania loses essentially its entire proven passing-game production from a unit that finished 29th in passing yards per game. Ronan Johannson (4 catches, 39 yards) and Connor Johns are the only returners with any catches on the books, while Justin Alpert, Dakota Brower, Jayden Drayton and Luke Johnson arrive with no prior stats to lean on. Rick Santos still has the third-down conversion machine that ranked 2nd nationally in that category, but this group has to manufacture a new go-to target rather than replace one by name.

Michael Hegarty and Jack Donnelly split the receiving work at tight end last season, but neither found the end zone, combining for zero touchdowns on their catches even as Penn ran the No. 2 third-down offense in the country. That efficiency without a scoring threat at tight end is the tell: Rick Santos gets Dante Barone and Markus Brown back into the mix and adds Andrew Gillman from Mainland Regional, none of whom carry prior stats, so the position's next scoring chunk plays has to come from an unproven name stepping up rather than a proven producer. With the passing game already humming at 239 yards per game (29th nationally) but explosiveness sitting at just 92nd, whichever tight end breaks through as a big-play threat changes the ceiling of this offense.

Penn's offense finished a strong 2nd nationally on third downs and 47.1% on offensive success rate a year ago, but four linemen are out the door in William Bergin, Jake Bingham, Netinho Olivieri and Maxwell Freeman, so that efficiency now rests on whoever solidifies around Tyler Blevins, Mike Fernicola, Alex Fletcher, Michael Gidaro and Aaron Kruse. Rick Santos adds Foard Polley at interior line and incoming lineman Joe Weiler, who joins out of high school at Lakeridge, to fill the gaps up front. The bigger question is whether this group can push a run game that managed just 139 yards per game (76th) closer to the level of a passing attack that ranked 29th, because the explosiveness number, 92nd, says defenses were still bottling up big plays behind this front.

Rick Santos rolls into 2026 with the entire front rotation of Adeyeye Adebawore, Alexandro Armour Jr., Marco Carone, Cole Erickson, Liam Forster and Cosmo Fusco back after a defense that let opponents stay on schedule 43.0% of the time, a below-average number that ranked 74th, and gave up 5.74 yards per play. That production hole gets filled without four departed linemen in Brady Ioannidis, Paul Jennings, Carter Janki and Jake Davis, but with six trench pieces already in place, the answer to a run defense that held up at 138 yards allowed per game (41st) is continuity, not a rebuild. The pass defense at 238 yards allowed per game (87th) is where this returning group has to actually move the needle for Penn to take a step forward.

Daniel Russo anchors a linebacker corps that watched opposing rushers gash them for 138 yards a game, good for 41st nationally, while the pass defense lagged at 87th in yards allowed. DJ Brown, Kadari Machen, John Lista and Ryan O'Connell are all gone, but Aiden Bergin, Zach Darche, Joey Holliday, Mack Long and Derek McCrum return to a group whose production simply was not tracked in the box score last year. Rick Santos needs that quintet to turn quiet 2025 tape into tackles that show up on the stat sheet, because a defense that already ranks 64th in points allowed per game cannot absorb another year of invisible linebacker play.

Andrew Bruce, Christian Carter, Ethan Cohall, Brock Cornell, Jahir Dawud and Kayleb Ervin all return to a secondary that gave up 238 passing yards per game, 87th nationally, while the front held up much better against the run (138 yards allowed, 41st). Sage Webb, Ty Cortes and Alec Wills are gone, but the volume of familiar faces coming back gives Rick Santos a chance to actually fix the pass defense with continuity rather than personnel turnover. If that group tightens the coverage that lagged behind the run defense in 2025, Penn's overall defensive numbers (64th in points allowed, 61st in yards allowed) should climb closer to what the front seven already showed it could do.

Mason Walters handled placekicking duties last fall, hitting 8 of 10 field goals with a long of 47 and 51 points, and he is back to anchor the kicking game in 2026 even as Sam Smith's more limited 1-of-2 ledger departs. Punting is muddier: Santiago Sturla's steady 23-punt, 37.8-yard season is gone, leaving Christian de Villiers, who logged just four punts at a 33.5 average, as the returning option. Josh Barnavon and long snapper Luke Castelli both return without any prior stats on file, so the results this unit produces in 2026 will be almost entirely new data points for Rick Santos to evaluate.

Cadin Olsen at Quarterback

Pennsylvania loses Liam O'Brien and his 2376 yards and 19 touchdowns with zero reinforcements from the portal, leaving Cadin Olsen, a receiver with 3 catches for 29 yards last season, projected to move to quarterback and run the offense. Donte West and Sean Williams Jr. give Olsen a real ground game behind him, but a receiver making that jump with no transfer help and a 165th-ranked recruiting class caps how much this offense can carry the season.

Rick Santos, Homebody Bettor's Friend

Penn is a coin flip against the number overall at 5-5, but that masks a real split under Rick Santos: bettors cashed at a 60% clip at home (3-2) while going just 2-3 (40%) on the road. The bounce-back trend is the sharpest signal here, covering at a 75% rate (3-1) the week after a loss, suggesting books adjust the line but not the Quakers' response. Road underdog spots are the one to avoid, with Penn covering just once in three tries away from Franklin Field.