July is here, and with college football creeping back onto the calendar, Boston College’s 2026 outlook is starting to take shape. The ACC media days are set for next week, and with fewer than 60 days until the season kicks off, the Eagles are moving deeper into a ranking of their 26 most important players for the third year under Bill O’Brien.
At No. 24, the spotlight lands on another transfer: Maryland running back Nolan Ray.
Ray arrived in Chestnut Hill after a career that included 25 games and three starts at Maryland. He logged more than 600 rushing yards and four touchdowns, with two of those scores coming last year against Towson and Nebraska.
His best single-game output came against Rutgers last season, when he ran for a career-high 77 yards on five carries. In 2025, he was also named to the Doak Walker Award preseason watchlist before entering the portal last season.
A Bloomfield Hills, Michigan native, Ray was a three-star recruit in the 2023 class and originally signed with Maryland. He was ranked by 247Sports as the No. 72 running back in the country and now comes to Boston College as a three-star transfer ranked No. 129 at the position.
Boston College brought in both Ray and Evan Dickens this offseason as it looked to replace Jordan McDonald, who graduated, and Turbo Richard, who entered the transfer portal. Dickens has the bigger career numbers and has generated plenty of buzz as a possible every-down option, but his smaller frame matters in a program that has leaned on two backs since Bill O’Brien took over two seasons ago. That opens the door for Ray to carve out a real role.
Bo MacCormack, Sedric Addison and Mekhi Dodd are also in the mix, but Ray looks like a strong candidate to become a regular contributor. He and Dodd are the biggest backs on the roster, and Ray’s experience, especially against Big Ten competition, could give him the edge.
The expectation is that he fills a role similar to McDonald’s from last season: a bigger back who can wear down defenses and pick up tough yards.
As Mitch Wolfe wrote in his scouting report: "He flashes all the qualities of a very good running back, including some very promising snaps as a receiver and blocker. But he needs to turn those flashes into routine parts of his game, even when he's not getting a ton of touches.
If he can't, it's going to be hard to rely on him to be a high-volume player at the position. But if Ray can put it all together, he could be just as good, if not better, than Turbo Richard.
" -Mitch Wolfe.
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