Marinopoulos is ready for sophomore campaign
TROY » The main focus on RPI Football so far this preseason has been how much experience returns from last season’s NCAA tournament clinching team.
Probably the most important part of that returning group is now sophomore Quarterback George Marinopoulos.
“It was a lot different coming into camp this year,” said Marinopoulos. “Didn’t have to adjust to anything new, just got to come in and play football and have fun with it.”
Marinopoulos comes into the season after playing in seven games last season for the Engineers. Marinopoulos threw for 1031 yards and completed 95 passes on 148 attempts and averaged almost 146 yards a game. Marinopoulos threw eleven touchdowns and only five interceptions.
Marinopoulos earned himself the Team Offensive Rookie of the Year, Liberty League Rookie of the Week
three times, and the ECAC North Rookie of the Week once.
The stats indicate that Marinopoulos had the potential to be the clear QB1 last season, but RPI Head Coach Ralph Isernia did not want to rush the quarterback’s progression.
“I was struggling with last year on when to pull the trigger and get him in game situation. We knew what we had in him,” said Isernia. “It’s certainly nice to have a guy that has that experience, has playoff experience, big game experience, coming back, and it is really helping the offense.”
Marinopoulos big game experience comes in the form of a Liberty League Championship clinching win over Union and an NCAA tournament loss to Wesley College.
Against Union, Marinopoulos went 19 for 28 and 166 yards and two touchdowns.
The Liberty League Championship gave RPI and auto-bid into the NCAA tournament where they met Wesley College. The Engineers lost 45-27 with Marinopoulos going 21 for 36 for 227 yards and two touchdowns.
Now with that big game experience, Marinopoulos and the RPI offense are energized for what lies ahead.
“As a group we have a lot of guys back, I think as a whole we are a lot more confident in everything we are doing,” said Marinopoulos. “It’s really awesome to come back with all the guys. Everybody just really had a good feeling coming back to campus.”
As a freshman quarterback, Marinopoulos earned the trust of his teammates, and especially his offensive line, but that came with time. Isernia thinks that having a freshman quarterback in behind them last season made the offensive line work harder.
“You saw them say, ‘hey we’ve got a freshman back there he might not know everything or he might need a little more help, we might need to get him a little more time,’” said Isernia. “Running backs and wide receivers all pitched in, they all rallied together.”
Isernia felt the way the Engineers came together to help the young QB, was an example of their character.
“The whole team really rallied behind that and I was happy about that, That’s a sign of our leadership and that’s a sign of our team,” said Isernia.
Marinopoulos and the Engineers come into the 2018 a step ahead from where they were last year. With a season under his belt, and the team better for going through that year together, Marinopoulos and the team are poised for a great year, and a return back to the NCAA tournament.
“We’re just focusing on September 1 right now,” said Marinopoulos. “We want to get better today. We got better today as at team. And everyday in practice we are trying to get 1% better as a team.”