Stony Brook football star Roland Dempster focused on taking next step
Stony Brook RB Roland Dempster at practice on Aug. 16 at LaValle Stadium. Credit: Michael A. Rupolo Sr.
The rise of the Stony Brook football program under second-year coach Billy Cosh has neatly traveled the same arc as running back Roland Dempster’s college career.
After turning a team that had been 0-10 in 2023 into an 8-4 threat a year ago, the No. 24 FCS-ranked Seawolves are looking to soar to new heights this season. The same is true for the 6-foot, 235-pound Dempster.
Stony Brook’s 10 p.m. season opener is Thursday at San Diego State.
Dempster’s improvement from 2023 to 2024 was marked. As the Seawolves went winless, he rushed for 408 yards and three touchdowns on 93 carries. In his breakthrough last season, he led the Coastal Athletic Association in rushing yards with 1,332 yards and ran for 18 touchdowns on 268 rushes. He also caught 32 passes for an average gain of 10.5 yards per catch and had a receiving touchdown.
“Roland got in better shape and was in better condition to play more snaps,” Cosh said. “He’s always had a toughness in how he ran the football, but the coaching staff helped him with a level of detail, teaching him reads and progressions [with] the drill work we do. It’s also how he caught the ball — he’s a good pass catcher from the backfield — and that was key, too . . . It was a culmination of things.”
“Honestly, it was a relief,” Dempster, a graduate student from Staten Island, said of the 2024 season. “Even though every game [in 2023] I’d [try] to have an edge on me — like ‘Yo, I am trying to win this game’ — it’s still hard to go out there and lose every game. So this past season was like a release, like the hard work wasn’t for nothing.”
He and Cosh are not the only ones expecting him to take things to the next level this season. He was named to the preseason All-America first team by FCS expert Phil Steele and to the preseason All-America second team by FCS Football Central.
“You can see the coaches are definitely being harder on him this year because they don’t want any complacency,” offensive lineman Niko Papic said. “There’s a higher standard to meet now.”
Looking back, Dempster said Cosh and his staff put an emphasis on conditioning and endurance as soon as they took over the program and that he felt the results as the season went on.
“Our coaches had us prepared more last season,” Dempster said. “It started in spring when we were doing [a lot of] drills and more hard things to build us up to play in the third and fourth quarters. I feel like that’s where I got most of my yards during the season, in the third and fourth quarters.
“Coach [Cosh] preached being [tough] in the fourth quarter to outlast the other team.”
“It’s mental stamina as well, and physical stamina and it comes from [the fact] that we practice hard and . . . we’re running the whole time,” Cosh explained. “The [stamina] is definitely part of it for Roland.”
Dempster had three games where he exceeded 200 all-purpose yards and seven where he scored more than one touchdown last season. He scored three touchdowns in a game three times, the first Seawolves player to do that since Miguel Maysonet in 2011.
“He always has those intangible things and was always a tough runner, but he gained confidence,” Cosh said. “Our [offensive] line also improved, gave him some pathways to run the ball and some creases.”
“We want him to keep it going,” he added. “He’s got to continue that for us this year for sure.”
Roger Rubin returned to Newsday in 2018 to write about high schools, colleges and baseball following 20 years at the Daily News. A Baseball Hall of Fame voter since 2011, he has covered 13 MLB postseasons and 14 NCAA Final Fours.
