Published for Richmond Kickers fans — October 2026
By Toxlay Sports Editorial Team · Last updated October 23, 2026
⚽ Richmond Kickers Fans — Your Roos Are Waiting!
Thirty-four straight seasons of professional soccer, a hat trick hero in red, and one last home night under the City Stadium lights. The season ends Saturday — wear the red and send the Roos off loud.
The Club
The Richmond Kickers Soccer Club was founded in 1993, which makes the Kickers — tied with the Charleston Battery — one of the oldest continuously operating professional soccer clubs in the United States. The first match was a 1–0 win over the Columbia Spirit on May 8, 1993, and the club has not stopped since: 2026 is Richmond’s 34th consecutive season, its eighth in USL League One as a founding member, and its 22nd in the American third tier. The nickname is the Roos, the mascot is Kickeroo, and the colors are red, white and black.
Home is City Stadium on Maplewood Avenue — a grand old ground opened in 1929 that has hosted the Kickers since 1995. Richmond configures it for about 6,000 fans on natural grass, and the River City Red Army supporters group owns Section O, where the noise starts long before kickoff and rarely lets up. When people search for the Richmond Kickers schedule, this is the address they are really looking for.
The trophy cabinet holds a piece of American soccer history: the 1995 double, when Richmond lifted the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup and the USISL Premier League title in the same year. Add USL Second Division playoff titles in 2006 and 2009, third-tier regular-season crowns in 2006, 2007, 2013 and 2022, an A-League regular-season title in 2001, seven James River Cups, and a famous 2011 Open Cup semifinal run that knocked out two MLS clubs — few clubs anywhere in the USL system can match that shelf.
The dugout told its own story this year. Darren Sawatzky, in charge since November 2019, departed on June 15, 2026 when expansion club Sporting Cascades FC bought out his contract — the first mid-season head-coaching change in club history. Former Kickers player Brian Ownby, who had joined as an assistant in January, stepped up as interim head coach and claimed his first league win on August 1. It was also the first season since 2019 without club legend Emiliano Terzaghi, whose three straight League One Player of the Year awards once defined this team.
⭐ FAN FAVORITE
#11 Pannholzer — Richmond Kickers Style Jersey
$59.99
The hat trick hero in the red Crossing Kit with white sleeves — fan-inspired apparel made for the Red Army end of City Stadium.
Last Season (2025): A Rare Down Year
Richmond is a playoff-regular club, which is exactly why 2025 stung. The Kickers finished 13th of 14 with eight wins, 17 losses and five draws, missing the USL League One playoffs for the first time since 2023. The cups offered no shelter either: the Open Cup ended in the first round with a 3–0 defeat to NPSL side Virginia Dream — a genuine upset that still gets mentioned — and the USL Cup run stopped in the group stage.
Honduran forward Darwin Espinal carried the attack with a team-high nine goals, and the year closed with the Terzaghi era winding down and a full visual rebrand rolling out across the club. It was a season that asked hard questions of a proud institution — and set up the narrative-driven kit program and the rebuild that defined 2026.
Best Players Right Now
Tarik Pannholzer — #11, forward. The German winger arrived from Weiche Flensburg last December after college soccer at Marshall, and he finished 2026 as Richmond’s top scorer with eight goals. His ten-minute hat trick against Corpus Christi on October 17 was only the fourth in League One all season — and the first by a Kicker since Alhaji Kamara’s in 2017. Thirty-one appearances of direct, fearless wide play.
Josh Kirkland — #9, center forward. The hometown No. 9. A Richmond local and Mary Washington product, Kirkland led the team’s scoring chart for most of the season and finished with six goals in all competitions. When City Stadium needed a focal point, the local boy was it — the face of the Kickers’ attack all year long.
Yann Fillion — #1, goalkeeper. The 6’3″ Canadian from Ottawa, signed from Floriana FC in Malta, has been one of the busiest keepers in League One — the club ranks him among the league’s top three in saves. Behind the leakiest defense in the division, his shot-stopping kept more than a few scorelines respectable.
Sam Layton — #4, center back. The Australian is the team’s minutes and defensive-actions leader: a club preview this month credited him with a team-high 2,474 minutes across 28 league matches, plus 163 clearances, 139 duels won and 33 interceptions. Unglamorous numbers, enormous workload.
Lucca Dourado — #70, forward. The Brazilian signed from Birmingham Legion in March and caught fire when it mattered late — his volley in the 5–1 win over Corpus Christi was his third goal in four matches, and he also scored in the October 3 comeback against One Knoxville.
Dakota Barnathan — #2, defender/midfielder, captain. The VCU product and veteran leader made his 150th career USL League One regular-season appearance on October 17 — and marked the run-in by scoring the second-minute opener in the win over Knoxville.
Star Spotlight
The hat trick night. October 17, 2026: Richmond 5, Corpus Christi 1 at City Stadium, and the night belonged to Pannholzer. A penalty on 50 minutes, then goals at 53′ and 60′ — a ten-minute hat trick, the first by a Richmond player in more than nine years. Dourado volleyed another at 51′, Owen O’Malley scored his first professional goal at 74′, Barnathan hit his 150th league appearance, and the Kickers piled up 24 shots. In a last-place season, it was a night to bottle.
The two-minute salvo. Two weeks earlier, on October 3, Richmond stunned One Knoxville — the reigning champions — 3–2 at City Stadium. Barnathan scored at 2′, Dourado at 5′, and after Knoxville clawed back, Tyler Freeman’s chest finish with roughly 18 minutes to play won it. Proof, on the right night, that this young side could bloody anyone’s nose.
The 1995 double. Every Richmond story bends back to 1995: the U.S. Open Cup and a league championship in the same season, a feat that turned a young club into an institution. Thirty-four straight seasons later, the Roos are still here — and still measuring themselves against that standard.
🔥 More Fan Favorites
More Roos stars, same red and white.
This Season (2026): Bottom of the Table, Heads Held High
The numbers do not lie, and nobody in Richmond is dressing them up: 17th of 17, seven wins, 19 losses and five draws from 31 matches, 37 goals scored and a league-worst 64 conceded. The playoff race ended long before the final weekend, and the October 24 finale against Greenville is the last match of the Kickers’ season.
And yet. The autumn brought green shoots that felt real: the 3–2 comeback win over the champions from Knoxville, the 5–1 demolition of Corpus Christi, and an Open Cup run that reached the Round of 32 — beating NOVA FC in March before hosting MLS side Columbus Crew at City Stadium on April 16. A first-ever mid-season coaching change, a first season without Terzaghi, and a young core that kept swinging: 2026 was a rebuilding year in the truest sense, and the Red Army never stopped singing through it.
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Mark Your Calendar
Saturday, October 24, 2026 — vs Greenville Triumph SC, City Stadium (6:00 p.m. ET). The regular-season finale and Fan Appreciation Night — Richmond’s 32nd and final league match of 2026. The all-time series is tight (Richmond 7 wins, 9 losses, 5 draws), and the last meeting finished 2–2 in USL Cup group play in July.
October 30 – November 1, 2026 — USL League One Quarterfinals. The top eight open the single-elimination playoffs. Charlotte Independence arrive as Players’ Shield winners, and Union Omaha are locked into the No. 2 seed — Richmond will watch this round from home and start planning the response.
November 6–8, 2026 — USL League One Semifinals. Four clubs, two places in the Final, one weekend.
November 13–15, 2026 — USL League One Final. The 2026 champion is crowned. The Kickers’ own final memories live in the cup cabinet — and in the target list for 2027.
Biggest Rivalries — The Wars
1. Greenville Triumph SC — the League One originals’ feud. Both clubs are founding members of USL League One from 2019, and Richmond bills Greenville as a regional foe. The series could hardly be tighter — seven Richmond wins, nine Greenville wins, five draws — and the fixture list keeps dealing them the big dates: the 2–2 USL Cup draw in Greenville on July 11, and the 2026 season finale at City Stadium on October 24. Fitting.
2. Charleston Battery — the 1993 clubs. The two oldest continuously operating professional clubs in American soccer, both born in 1993, spent years battling through the USL’s second and third tiers before Charleston settled in the USL Championship. They still collide in the USL Cup — most recently on May 16, 2026, when Charleston won 4–0 at City Stadium in group play. Respect between the ancients, and no mercy.
3. Virginia Beach Mariners — the James River Cup (historic). Virginia’s intrastate war ran from the late 1990s until the Mariners folded in 2009. Richmond won the James River Cup seven times — 1998, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005 — and the Mariners’ last triumph came in 2006. The rivalry is dormant, but it remains a core piece of Kickers folklore, retold every time a new fan asks why 1995 was only the beginning.
Frequently Asked Questions
When do the Richmond Kickers play next?
Richmond close their 2026 season on Saturday, October 24, 2026, at home to Greenville Triumph SC at City Stadium (6:00 p.m. ET) on Fan Appreciation Night. The Kickers are eliminated from the USL League One playoffs, so this is the final match of their year — the playoffs themselves run from the October 30 quarterfinals to the Final on November 13–15.
Who is the Richmond Kickers’ best player?
German winger Tarik Pannholzer (No. 11) is Richmond’s top scorer in 2026 with eight goals, including a ten-minute hat trick against Corpus Christi FC on October 17 — the first Kickers hat trick since 2017. Richmond-born striker Josh Kirkland (No. 9) led the scoring chart for most of the season, and Canadian goalkeeper Yann Fillion (No. 1) ranks among League One’s top three in saves.
Where do the Richmond Kickers play, and how do I get tickets?
Home matches are at City Stadium in Richmond, Virginia — a historic ground opened in 1929 that has been the Kickers’ home since 1995, configured for about 6,000 fans on natural grass, with the River City Red Army supporters in Section O. Tickets are sold through the club’s official site, and USL League One matches stream on ESPN+ in the United States, with select matches on CBS Sports networks.
Have the Richmond Kickers ever won a trophy?
Yes — famously, the 1995 double: the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup and the USISL Premier League title in the same year. Richmond also won USL Second Division playoff titles in 2006 and 2009, third-tier regular-season titles in 2006, 2007, 2013 and 2022, seven James River Cups, and reached the Open Cup semifinals in 2011.
⚽ Richmond Kickers Fan Shop
The full Roos trio — Pannholzer, Kirkland and Fillion in red and white.
Sources & official links: Richmond Kickers official site · USL League One official site · Richmond Kickers tickets
Red shirts, full voice, thirty-four seasons strong — up the Roos, Richmond.
