Correspondent file photo / Robert Hayes Youngstown State linebacker Mike Wells (3) and the rest of the Penguins’ defense celebrate after recovering a fumble in a win over Robert Morris last season on Sept. 6 at Stambaugh Stadium.

YOUNGSTOWN — Since its season wrapped up at the end of November, the Youngstown State football team has spent the past two months taking stock of the 2025 campaign, while also beginning to ramp things up in preparing for 2026.

By the end of the season, when playing their best, the Penguins believed they were capable of beating any team in the country. But they also had “bad habits,” as described by head coach Doug Phillips, that made it possible for them to lose to anyone, which obviously came to fruition with YSU’s second-half collapse in the first round of the FCS playoffs against Yale.

“Those are things as we go into this offseason that we gotta correct,” Phillips said. “Because we know we can beat any team in the country if we get our minds to it, now what are the habits that stopped us? What are the habits when we got big leads on teams that stopped us from taking it to the next level? Those are the things, I think, that motivate you.

“I always say, you gotta learn through the pain, and I think you can grow through the pain. Those are the lessons, tough, hard lessons that we gotta make sure that we fix in the months of January and February in the weight room, on the field in the spring, on to summer and camp, so we don’t make the same mistakes next year.”

The Penguins often played their best from behind in 2025, coming back in wins over Towson, Illinois State and Southern Illinois.

But, many of those “bad habits” had a tendency to pop up in games that the Penguins had leads, even big leads, such as South Dakota State, Northern Iowa and Yale.

Phillips and the rest of the Penguins hope the addition of former Mercyhurst head coach Ryan Riemedio as the team’s new defensive coordinator will help remedy some of the shortcomings that YSU had on that side of the ball.

“I think for us, it comes down to confidence, it comes down to attention to details, focus and not being complacent,” Phillips said. “The scoreboard don’t matter until you walk off the field after 60 minutes of play. Those are the things that we gotta reinforce as we go through the next six months so it doesn’t reoccur. We have to know how to finish games, we have to have no mercy, even when you’re up. If we can do those things, I think we have a product that we can put on the field to go compete with anybody in the country.”

NEW ADDITIONS

Since the end of the 2025 season, YSU added 21 high school signees in early December and finalized 19 new additions from the transfer portal over the past couple weeks.

The 11 members of the high school class that enrolled early, the group of transfers, along with the cast of returning Penguins, which includes quarterback Beau Brungard, linebackers Mike Wells and, defensive ends Mike Voitus and Ebony Curry Jr., running back Jaden Gilbert, tight ends Alex McDonald and Austin Bray and the entire offensive line, have all begun offseason workouts this month as prep work begins to ramp up to spring practice in a couple months.

“Excited to get after it this spring with 108 guys. It’ll be competitive,” Phillips said. “I told our young men — and we got a lot of young men — it’s going to be a competitive spring to see who wants to get on that field.”

The Penguins lost their entire starting secondary and their five of their top-six receiving targets to graduation and to the portal. So, the primary focus of YSU’s transfer targets came at those positions.

Phillips said the Penguins wanted more size in the secondary, particularly at cornerback. To fill those spots, YSU signed Cincinnati’s Stanley Clyne, New Hampshire’s Raleigh Collins III, Butler’s Devaon Holman, Iowa State’s Cam Smith, Washburn’s Julius Jackson and Shippensburg’s Darvens Tunis.

“The secondary, we knew, was critical,” Phillips said. “We wanted to get bigger back there. We wanted to get length. We feel we have good length at safety, bringing in some older guys.”

At receiver, the Penguins will have plenty of competition between returners RK Dandridge and Fresh Walters, along with newcomers Bryan Hunt (Findlay), Lorenze Jenkins (Bethune-Cookman), Zane Kinsey (Cincinnati), Connor Smith (Assumption), Dorian Williams (Ohio State), Aiden Stephens (Yale) and Lynn Wyche-El (Grand Valley State).

“We want to make it competitive in the wide receiver room,” Phillips said. “I think we brought in seven wide receivers. So when you got the best quarterback in the country, you gotta find targets for him. We wanted to make sure we had plenty of firepower on the perimeter for Beau to be able to throw to. I thought we did a great job addressing those needs.”

LOCAL FLAVOR

Of the transfer class, a handful have familiar names.

Five trace their roots to the Mahoning Valley, while a host of others are from Western Pennsylvania, Northeast Ohio or elsewhere in the Buckeye state.

“When you go portal, we always try to look at our footprint. What’s our footprint of recruiting? Ohio — 77% of our roster’s from Ohio. That’s important to us. Western PA, that’s important to us. That’s what we look for. It’s great to get some guys from another FCS or FBS, but are they in our footprint of recruiting? They all fit in that little footprint that we believe is important. And really, I think our young men see that in the locker room.”

Of the locals, Cam Smith played at Austintown Fitch, Stephens played at LaBrae, Iowa State transfer LB Danny Inglis and Robert Morris transfer OL Vince Luce played at Canfield and Akron LB Danny Nittoli played at Poland.

“How nice is it to get kids like Danny Inglis, Cam Smith, guys you already know, already had a relationship with their fathers, with their families,” Phillips said. “I mean, Aiden Stephens, I’ve known Tony (Stephens) forever. So sometimes it’s just pieces of the puzzle. You don’t know that in December as you’re going into (recruiting), but pieces of the puzzle fall in and you’re like, this is really cool.”

LOOKING AHEAD

According to Phillips, YSU slightly pushed back the start of spring practice.

The university has spring break from March 2-9, and then the Penguins will open spring ball on March 17 — St. Patrick’s Day.

“We want to come off that spring break, get back in the weight room a little bit for a week and get our guys ready to go,” Phillips said. “We’ll go Tuesday, Thursday, Saturdays like we always do, and instead of practicing on Easter weekend on Saturday, we’ll go Good Friday.”

Then YSU wraps up spring practice on April 18 with the annual Red-White Spring Game.

“Shoot, this year, we may draft two teams just because the numbers allow us to,” Phillips said. “I’ve never gone into spring with this many on our roster, which is exciting.”

The Penguins open the 2026 season on Aug. 27 against Mercyhurst at Stambaugh Stadium.