So much for "Marcomentum."

Sen. Marco Rubio, who failed to win any of the first four nominating contests, has shown little ability to cut into Donald Trump's lead, even in Rubio's home state of Florida.

A new poll out from Quinnipiac University Thursday, the first taken in Florida since January, shows Rubio gaining slightly overall but making little headway against Trump, who still holds a wide lead over the field.



Forty-four percent of likely Republican voters surveyed said they planned to support the billionaire real estate mogul in the March 15 primary, compared to just 28 percent who favored Rubio.

Texas Sen. Ted Cruz trails with just 12 percent support, followed by Ohio Gov. John Kasich, with 7 percent, and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson, with 4 percent.



Rubio's narrowing path to the nomination counts on his winning Florida's contest, where the victor will collect all of the state's 99 delegates – the biggest haul of any winner-take-all state in the 2016 cycle.

"If Sen. Rubio can't win in his own home state, it is difficult to see how he can win elsewhere," Quinnipiac polling director Peter Brown said.

Trailing Trump in national polls and the Super Tuesday primary states, Rubio has struggled to identify the states where he expects to win. He has attempted to downplay his challenge by suggesting he can capture the nomination by winning enough delegates to prevent Trump from obtaining an outright majority, then unifying the opposition at the Republican National Convention in July.

"You don't win the nomination by how many states you win," Rubio said on Fox News Tuesday.

Cruz, who is battling Rubio to claim the non-Trump vote, can at least point to his win in Iowa and recent polling in his home state. Although Cruz appears poised to win Texas, the Lone Star state assigns its delegates proportionally, meaning any victory there will be somewhat blunted in the chase for the 1,237 delegates necessary to win the nomination.

Rubio can take some solace in Thursday's poll, in which 21 percent of respondents said they would definitely not support Trump for the Republican nomination, and 26 percent said the same of Cruz. Seventeen percent said they would not support Rubio.



He also appears to have benefited directly from the exit from the race of his erstwhile mentor, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who dropped out last weekend after placing fourth in South Carolina.

Surveys from January, when Bush was still in the race, showed Rubio below 20 percent in Florida, while Bush averaged around 10 percent.

If Trump does well on Super Tuesday, as is expected, his rivals' only other chance to stop his march to the nomination, besides Florida, is in Ohio, where 66 winner-take-all delegates are at stake.