Much less uncertainty surrounding the specialists entering 2026. With Ned Gray returning at punter and our new starting kicker already announced, the Spiders have the pieces in place for another good year on special teams.

Roster

#35 | Gavin Winterhalter | Sophomore

#37 | Ned Gray | Sophomore

#45 | Kyle Bitsko | Freshman

#46 | EJ Sutherland | Freshman

#48 | Weston Sharpe | Senior

#97 | Jackson Bonser | Sophomore

Additions

Kyle Bitsko – A local product from Douglas Freeman High School, Bitsko earned a 5-star rating at a Kohl’s kicking camp and was 1st-team All-State his senior year. He showed off a big leg with multiple field goals of 50+ yards and also handled kickoff and punting duties while at Freeman.

EJ Sutherland – Sutherland was a very late addition to the roster. Out of Baltimore, Maryland, Sutherland looks to be a former soccer player who switched to football. For a freshman who’s new to the game, #46 has done well in his first camp.

Snapping

In March, I put out that Ben Ferber had joined the Spiders in this year’s freshman class, however he has since committed elsewhere. That leaves senior Wes Sharpe and running back/long snapper Andrew McKenzie snapping for the Spiders in 2026.

Wes Sharpe hasn’t had many opportunities up to this point but his patience has paid off, as he’ll now be our main short-snapper in 2026. He was a top-20 rated snapper coming out of high school in 2023, so we look to be in good shape. He’s done a nice job working with both Ashten Snelsire and Ned Gray as holders, so the expectation is that this operation remains clean this fall.

For someone I had only seen at running back before this spring, McKenzie has exceeded expectations. He continues to spend time with the 1s on punt (as does Sharpe), so I wouldn’t be shocked to see him get a chance early on.

Punting

Ned Gray returns for his sophomore season after a solid freshman campaign. The lefty averaged 38.8 yards/punt with 21 downed inside the 20 and three 50+ yarders. Most importantly, we only allowed eight punts to be returned (t-5th fewest in the FCS) for a mere 36 yards (4th fewest). Coach Huesman always talks about our punting operation centering around avoiding returns and Gray did a good job in his first year.

Entering his second season, it’s really about seeing steady progress. Looking at Aaron Trusler’s stats from 2021-2024, you see every major category slightly improving year by year.

Gray had a nearly identical NET punting average compared to Trusler’s freshman year, while allowing opponents to return a far lower percentage of punts. If Gray can keep returns low and add a yard or two to his NET punting average we’ll be in fantastic shape.

Kicking

I was hoping for a less dramatic fall camp this year and that certainly was the case. The Spiders exited 2025 camp with “no kicking whatsoever” (per Coach Huesman in a post-practice interview) and had no real game plan come Lehigh. Ultimately the role landed with graduate student Jayden Alsheskie and he did a fine job. 9/12 on field goals (with two of those misses being blocks) and 31/31 on PATs. Last season showed us two things.

1. You need to know who your kicker is before Week 1
2. PATs & field goals under 40 yards are what matter

The first one is easy. We must exit camp knowing who can and can’t kick field goals, and there are no doubts this year. Coach Huesman said early on that Kyle Bitsko and Gavin Winterhalter would be competing for the job, and they did great. He gave the nod to Kyle Bitsko but we’d be in fine shape with either guy. Both get great height on the ball and have plenty of leg.

The second is probably known by most but really proved itself true watching Alsheskie. We played in 10 one-possession games last year but never “needed” a long field goal to stay alive. What kept us in close games was Alsheskie making a high percentage from 30-39 yards and being perfect on PATs. Do Bitsko and Winterhalter have stronger legs than Jayden? Yes, and I’ll be thrilled when someone knocks down a 50-yarder, however that won’t be the thing that makes or breaks our season. Whether it was Andrew Lopez a few years ago or Alsheskie last season, we’ve all seen that consistently making the FGs that you should make is far more important than the long-range bombs.

Kickoffs

Richmond will need to replace kickoff specialist Will McManus, who had a very nice 2025. His touchback percentage of 33% was in the lower half of the FCS however good hangtime plus good coverage allowed the Spiders to hold opponents to an average starting field position of the 26 yard line. I don’t get to see a ton of kickoff work during practice however Bitsko and Jackson Bonser are both involved. There aren’t a ton of stats to track here – whoever can consistently put the ball in the end zone (or near it with good hangtime) gives our coverage team the best chance.

I’m interested to see who is on the kickoff coverage unit. We tend to play a few more starters than other teams however without the redshirt rule, there’s a chance to mix in more true freshmen. I’ve seen plenty of those guys working in throughout practices, so how we approach this against Bucknell is worth noting.

Returners

No changes from the practice updates. Jaiden Fair and Quanye Veney are our punt returners with a few other guys (Donovan Higgins, Jamaal Brown) working on kickoff returns.

Next Post

That does it for Fall Camp Updates and Position Group Previews. Hopefully, everyone enjoyed the nine positional breakdowns and two practice updates over the past three weeks.

Time to watch us play someone other than ourselves.

2026 — Game 1: Bucknell Preview: Friday, August 28th