TRENTON -- If you thought 2016 was a hold-your-nose-and-vote election, it might be time to get those clothespins out once more.

A new Fairleigh Dickinson University PublicMind Poll finds Republican candidate for New Jersey governor Kim Guadagno trailing Democrat Phil Murphy by 15 points among those voters who have made up their minds about whom they want to replace Gov. Chris Christie.

But the real story may be how many Garden State voters dislike the two major parties' offerings.

"The attitudes we're seeing today suggest that discontent runs far deeper than any one person or one administration," said Krista Jenkins, director of the FDU PublicMind Poll. "The people have lost faith in a system that seems to offer up leaders with few leadership skills."

The poll found Murphy holds a 15 point lead over Guadagno, 47 percent to 32 percent, with 5 percent preferring someone else and 13 percent remaining undecided just a day before the second gubernatorial debate.

However, an overwhelming majority of voters -- almost 8 out of 10 -- say the political system in the state is broken and doesn't give them much hope for finding capable leaders.

Barely a fifth-- 22 percent -- have faith they will find leaders who can address the state's myriad of problems.

That lack of confidence in the two major party candidates has informed an indifferent to lukewarm response to last week's first televised gubernatorial debate.

And among all likely voters who tuned in to the debate on the ABC affiliates in New York and Philadelphia, there was no consensus as to who did better. Guadagno, the state's lieutenant governor, got 29 percent, while Murphy, a former U.S. ambassador to Germany, got 27 percent -- virtually even, with 31 percent saying neither could claim they'd won.

The FDU poll also found that this year, winning the hearts of independent voters will be more crucial than usual -- something that may help Guadagno.

Both candidates garner about a quarter of independents who don't align with either party -- 25 percent of them for Guadagno; 26 perecent for Murphy and another 26 percent undecided.

But among the those who describe themselves as independents, Guadagno fared significantly better than Murphy in the last debate, and was judged to have performed better by 25 percent of the independents, compared with the 5 percent of independents who said Murphy carried the night.

The problem confronting Guadagno is that widespread voter discontent means that almost with no one is interested in watching the two debate, either. The poll found only a third of likely voters said they watched or listened to the debate.

"If the tide is to turn in her favor, she's going to need to not only do well, but get more people to actually watch or listen to the debate this week," said Jenkins.

The PublicMind poll of likely 658 likely voters was conducted by landline and cellular telephone from October 11 to 15, and has a margin of error of 4.5 percentage points.

Claude Brodesser-Akner may be reached at cbrodesser@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @ClaudeBrodesser. Find NJ.com Politics on Facebook.