Sans Tommy McIntosh, Central Michigan patient on filling out wide receiver depth chart
With McIntosh injured, the Chippewas will lean on Langston Lewis and a crew of younger receivers and transfers.
Mt. Pleasant — Central Michigan has a big role to fill at wide receiver following Tommy McIntosh going down with a torn ACL in the spring. And in looking to fill that role, the staff is keeping an open mind.
“Tommy's a special player and we'll miss him,” offensive coordinator Jim Chapin said. “We'll miss his toughness and playmaking ability, but we know we have other guys that are ready to step up to the plate and we're just going to, again, you put chum in the water and the sharks will go for it.. And right now there's chum in the water, so we're going to see who's going to go get it.”
Absent McIntosh, Central Michigan still has leading returning receiver Langston Lewis to lead the passing attack. But McIntosh, who finished second on the team in catches and yards in 2025 and is a bigger body, will be a notable loss atop the receiving corps. But regardless, the Chippewas are bullish on how the rest of the group can step up to fill the void. And the timeline for figuring that out is not pressing, as the Chippewa coaching staff will keep tabs on the group through the summer and, especially, through fall camp.
“It takes Tommy out of that equation, but it's going to put other guys into that equation,” Chapin said.
Lewis will certainly be the primary option entering fall camp, as he comes back with 43 catches and 596 yards and three touchdowns from 2025. From there, things thin out in terms of returning experience. The only other player with double-digit catches from 2025 returning is running back/offensive weapon Brock Townsend, who had 13 for 145 and a team-high four touchdowns.
There are some young receivers returning who had promising springs for Central Michigan, namely Justin Ruffin Jr., Nasir Williams and Collin Payne. Their production was slim in 2025 — 15 catches between the trio — but they flashed some playmaking throughout spring.
And along with Lewis and the Ruffin-Williams-Payne trio, CMU added two wideout transfers who practiced through the spring: Shawn Foster II and Dontae Robinson.
Foster began his career at Hope College for a season before transferring to Michigan State, where he spent the 2024 and 2025 seasons. He played one snap on special teams at MSU in 2025, but featured heavily with the top offensive groupings in spring.
Robinson arrives from Sacramento State, where he did not play in 2025, after two years playing at Sierra Junior College.
Robinson, a 6-foot-5, 215 pound wideout, actually played tight end at Sierra and finished with 63 catches for 771 yards and 10 touchdowns in 2024.
Andrew Graham
He’s got the sort of big frame that could be a one-to-one replacement for McIntosh’s skillset, but Chapin said the Chippewas aren’t looking to necessarily add a like-for-like replacement in the lineup.
“Would we want that? Man, that would be great,” Chapin said of an exact replacement for McIntosh. “He's such a special player, if we can clone him that would be great. But at the end of the day, we're going to let those guys be great at the things that they're great at, so we're going to cater what we do to what they do best.”
And ultimately, the Chippewas will try to be flexible in how they want to play offense and deploy the passing game.
“We just need to put our best guys out there,” Chapin said. “So we're going to figure out who those best guys are and then we're going to put them on the field. So no, not necessarily do we need that same physical prototype.”
They’ve already shown a willingness to heavily involve the backs in the passing game, and the return of Brock Townsend along with the arrival of freshman Trav Moore creates some intriguing pass catching options out of the backfield.
The tight ends — a transfer-heavy group — are also likely to factor in to the passing game.
And whether it’s someone like Ruffin or Williams emerging or Foster or Robinson stepping up, or some unforeseen development, Chapin and the Chippewas aren’t wed too heavily to any one idea of how the receiver room will pan out sans McIntosh.
And they will be watching the position closely through the summer and fall camp.
“The best answer is that every offense, the starting point has to be ‘Who are our best players and how do we get them the football?’” Chapin said.
