On Wednesday, news broke in the spring football world: the United Football League (UFL) is expanding to Rhode Island. With Birmingham and Houston being relocated in 2027, the UFL has settled on Pawtucket – bringing pro football in the spring back to the Northeast.
Rhode Island hasn’t had a professional football team since the Steam Rollers in the 1920s. The UFL making their way to Pawtucket is a rather bold move – but, the market does check some boxes that are incredibly important to the new era of the UFL that Repole is building.
Mike Repole has made it clear. Smaller venues, mainly developed for soccer, is the way to go. We saw just how good Louisville looked in their inaugural season, packing out Lynn Family Stadium week after week.
Pawtucket presents that exact opportunity. The Rhode Island team will play at Centreville Bank Stadium, a brand new facility that has plenty of openings for play. With capacity of 10,500 – it’s on the lower end, which means that if marketed properly, the optics should look excellent. The stadium can easily sell out every single week, providing an outstanding home environment for the team – alongside an enhanced viewing product on TV.
The field itself is turf, which is also critical. In years past, the UFL has had issues with venues strictly due to the natural grass pitch being in jeopardy. It is a broadcast ready venue, having recently been renovated for high-end TV telecasts.
Rhode Island itself isn’t the largest TV market by any means. They rank just 53rd in the entire country according to Neilsen data. Regionally, though, the Pawtucket-Providence-Bedford metro hosts nearly 2 million people – which leaves plenty of opportunity for the UFL to bring 10,000 fans to games each week.
The TV product will be great. ESPN and FOX have both done a tremendous job over the years. It’s also been evident that the league has a committed base of 500-600k fans who will watch every week, no matter what markets they’re in. While Rhode Island is smaller than Birmingham, we don’t anticipate a severe dropoff in weekly ratings due to this move.
The UFL will also be able to tap into the Boston/New England market. This is a fanbase who is extremely passionate about their teams. There’s a reason why the Boston Celtics and New England Patriots are two of the most well-known sports brands in the entire country.
That said, Rhode Island itself doesn’t even feature a professional sports team at all. There are no NFL, NBA, NHL, or MLS teams in the state.
“A group of us went on a tour all over the country, looking at venues and communities that had reached out and expressed interest in having a UFL franchise…We needed to look no further than Rhode Island and had conversations with [chairman and cofounder of Rhode Island FC] Brett Johnson and [director of development at Fortuitous Partners] Dan Kroeber and the team. We came up and visited as part of our tour and spent a lot of time with those guys.” – UFL CEO & President Russ Brandon
The UFL is also excited about the growth of Pawtucket and the surrounding areas in the coming years. Over $21 million of state funded money is going towards new housing developments, and the building of a bridge right by the venue. This is only good news for the United Football League. With Rhode Island being such a small state, it is quite easy to get to Pawtucket no matter where you live.
There has not been any branding announced yet for the Rhode Island team. That is expected to be live on October 18th, during a reveal event in Rhode Island. More details on that to come.
Rhode Island will make their UFL debut on April 2nd, under “Friday Night Lights” on FOX. Tickets are not yet available, but expected to be ready soon.
Are you excited for the UFL to play in Rhode Island? Do you think this was the right move for the league? Let us know down in the comments below, or join the conversation on Discord!
