The GOP’s Mike Kennealy is polling ahead of his two rivals in the race against Gov. Maura Healey in next year’s election, but it’s too early to take a victory lap with many voters still on the sidelines.

Kennealy holds 44% of the vote over primary opponents Brian Shortsleeve and Mike Minogue, both sitting at 13%. More than half of the would-be Republican or Independent voters in the poll, however, said they don’t know enough about the candidates to pick a side.

The Kennealy campaign is celebrating the UMass poll, released this week, as Shortsleeve questions the survey’s credibility, and Minogue points to donations as a stronger indicator of how Bay State Republicans are leaning a year out from the election.

UMass pollsters surveyed 800 respondents, with 416 Democrats and 183 Republicans or pure independents. Healey, the Democrat incumbent, leads each of the three GOP candidates by at least 21%.

“This poll confirms what we have been hearing in every corner of the Commonwealth: voters recognize that Mike Kennealy is the only candidate prepared to take on Maura Healey in 2026 and deliver real results,” Kennealy campaign manager Ben Hincher said in a statement.

“Mike will lower energy costs for Massachusetts families, cut taxes and burdensome regulations, audit the legislature, end sanctuary state policies, restore excellence in our schools, and return common sense to state government.”

Roughly a third of the respondents voting in a preview of the Republican primary stated that they were “not too familiar” with Kennealy, Shortsleeve and Minogue, and 19% “not familiar at all” with the GOP candidates.

Kennealy, a former housing and economic development secretary in Gov. Charlie Baker’s administration, first entered the race in April. Shortsleeve, a venture capitalist who ran the MBTA under Baker, followed behind, announcing his campaign in May.

Minogue, a major donor to President Trump and former CEO of heart-pump maker Abiomed Inc., jumped into the race last month.

In an email to supporters, Jim Barnett, general consultant for the Shortsleeve campaign, said the poll shouldn’t be taken seriously. He argued that the survey of Republican and Independent voters of the GOP candidates lacks credibility, with the rigor being “embarrassingly shallow,” and that the results “should have never been released.”

Barnett suggested that general election results, which pit Shortsleeve as the closest opponent individually to Healey over Kennealy and Minogue, are “far more credible.”

“Those toplines align with historic partisan margins at this stage of a campaign and other independent polling,” Barnett stated. “In contrast, the ‘Republican primary’ subsample lacks proper screening, weighting, and mathematical coherence, making it unfit for analysis or reporting.”

After Minogue announced his campaign in October, the South Hamilton resident received a $1.8 million first-month haul, nearly matching what Kennealy has raised and loaned himself during his months-long run since the spring.

Shortsleeve has raised just over $1 million.

“Mike is incredibly grateful for the support his campaign is seeing across Massachusetts with hundreds of volunteers and twice as many donors as the rest of the Republican field,” a Minogue campaign spokesperson told the Herald. “In just 21 days, he’s already passing lifetime politicians who’ve been in the race for more than half a year. People are ready for a new kind of leadership focused on accountability, affordability, and opportunity for every family in our state.”