Penn football is hoping for a better 2025 season after a rough finish to 2024
Penn head coach Ray Priore knows that it was the margins that downed the Quakers last season, but the last thing he plans to do heading into a promising 2025 is dwell on it.
It would have been easy for Penn head football coach Ray Priore to make an excuse.
A close examination of last year’s 4-6 record is not an accurate reflection of just how close the Quakers were in the games they found themselves on the losing end of. Among the six losses, only two were by a double-digit margin.
It’s what Priore hinted at when he, alongside quarterback Liam O’Brien, spoke during Monday’s Ivy League football media day. The losses showed what the group needed to tighten up, and the “discipline” they now need to display before opening the season in a little more than a month’s time against Stonehill on Sept. 20 (1 p.m., NEC Front Row).
“It starts with the ball, we’ve got to possess it; we’ve got to keep it and we got to go get it,” Priore said. “You can look at our plus-minus [from last season] … this league is all about points. The [end] goal is not three [points], the goal is seven. We’ve lost too many games by a very, very small margin. And the word I’ve used often this past nine months has been discipline.”
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Penn found out that the Ivy League also doesn’t care about margins after the Quakers were ranked No. 6 in conference preseason polls. Penn sits just above Cornell and Brown, but stares up at the remaining programs in the league, with a desire to prove that they’ve learned from their mistakes.
They’ll have to showcase just how much they’ve learned with O’Brien at the helm, who takes over for graduate Aidan Sayin, last year’s starter who threw for 1,108 yards and six touchdowns. However, it was O’Brien who stepped up after Sayin suffered a season-ending injury last season. O’Brien enters this season coming off a 1,000-yard passing season as well (1,018), in which he threw for 13 touchdowns and just two interceptions in four starts.
Penn returns its entire starting offensive linemen. In just the short time since the end of spring ball and early stages of training camps, O’Brien says the O-line stands to bring not just the “foundation,” but the “experience” to right the ship.
It would be quite lift now that the Quakers have more to play for with the Ivy League now officially competing for an opportunity to be a part of the playoff picture in the Football Championship Subdivision.
“We’re adjusting to new headsets, which is very exciting, but it’s going to take, you know, some time to just get used to the communication into my ears,” O’Brien said. “But on top of that everyone else still has to play. We have to communicate. We all have to be on the same page. It’s starts with we can’t give up the five yard penalties, no false starts. No jumping offsides. Um, you know, keep it simple and just be smart.”
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In addition to being smart, O’Brien also has a top target in Jared Richardson, the senior wide receiver who was named to the FCS Football Central preseason All-America team last month. Richardson, who led the team in touchdowns last year with seven, is 528 yards from ranking among the top 10 in program history in career receiving yards, and already ranks sixth in Penn history in touchdown catches.
However, the Quakers do have deficiencies on both sides of the ball, and none greater than the loss of sophomore rusher Malachi Hosley, who transferred to Georgia Tech at the end of the season, after being the Ivy League’s offensive player of the year last season.
“When you lose an Ivy League Offensive Player of the Year to the [NCAA transfer] portal and the NIL, that’s never, never good,” said Priore. But again, it’s got to be a next man up sort of mentality. We’ve done some internal things and we’re going to make some moves internally … Fortunately, as you’ve been around and you’ve watched people play, that’s probably the one position where early player who can play can tap in really early.”
One of those moves Priore admitted is a new role for wide receiver Julien Stokes. Stokes is contending to be the feature back behind O’Brien; the 5-foot-7, 180-pounder was second-team All-Ivy last season, coming off an injury that saw him finish with 37 receptions, 313 receiving yards, and two touchdowns.
Priore also noted that he was pleased with what he’s seeing from Dante West, heading into his sophomore season, and Sean “Pup” Williams.
There’s still plenty of time to fine-tune things in practice and against nonleague competition before opening Ivy League play at Franklin Field against Dartmouth on Oct. 4 (1 p.m., ESPN+). The Big Green finished No. 2 in the Ivy polling, just behind top-ranked Harvard.
Now, it’s getting back to the game of inches and worrying less about the margins.
“Our journey started right after the season,” said Priore. “I think we came off a season that I think for the players we’re not satisfied, [so] we had to reach deep down and start that process … and our kids have started that progression and are very hungry and excited to get back.”