From Sightlines To ‘Sailgating,' Inside Rhode Island FC's New Stadium
'There's something about the dynamic of being on water,' says Rhode Island FC chairman Brett M. Johnson.
He's talking about a picture he saw of the USL Championship team's new Centreville Bank Stadium in Pawtucket, which held its first matches earlier this month.
The 10,000 seat soccer-specific venue sits alongside the same Seekonk River that Johnson once rowed on as a student at Brown University. 'It wasn't pretty, honestly,' says Johnson, describing the polluted river of his student days. Pawtucket has cleaned up its industrial riverside in recent years though, turning once neglected brownfield sites into prime real estate. And the Centreville Bank Stadium is a central part of that.
Rhode Island FC isn't the first team Johnson has invested in. He was a founder of Phoenix Rising, and also helped lead the acquisition of Ipswich Town back when it was in the third tier of English soccer. Seeing the impact that Ipswich's on-field success has had on the local area, he hopes to achieve something similar in Pawtucket and give the country's smallest state something to cheer about.
Rhode Island FC's first cheer at the Centreville Bank Stadium came when Maxi Rodriguez scored in an Open Cup match against its Massachusetts neighbor New England Revolution. The Revs, who eventually won this local derby 2-1, plays its home games in Foxborough, which is actually closer to Pawtucket than it is to Boston.
But Johnson feels Rhode Island FC's home ground gives it something that its local rivals lack. He says, 'nothing detracts more from the beautiful game than playing in an NFL stadium' and says it's a great source of pride that Rhode Island is home to New England's first soccer-specific stadium. He says Revolution's fans deserve their own soccer-specific stadium too.
Getting that rectangular home was not easy though. For its inaugural season in 2024, Rhode Island FC played far out of town at the home of Bryant University's Bulldogs. It was also offered the 'Pawsox' baseball stadium when the minor league team moved out of the state, but that stadium's location was not easy to get to and the stadium itself was run-down and tired, not to mention being the wrong shape for soccer, so instead, RIFC chose to build its own stadium on a challenging brownfield site.
PAWTUCKET, RHODE ISLAND - MAY 7: Rhode Island FC and New England Revolution walk out during a 2025 ... More U.S. Open Cup game at Centreville Bank Stadium. (Photo by Mark Smith/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images)
The site had previously been used for a manufactured gas plant so the ground was full of toxic chemicals and had to be capped, meaning that all the utilities and foundations had to be designed above that cap.
Rhode Island FC co-founder Dan Kroeber says that the site's history made the build very complicated as they had to make sure they didn't dig below that cap. He says the stadium has been designed with sustainability in mind. It is an all-electric stadium and no plastic is used in its concessions stands, and it's also within walking distance of a new bus and train station. It has been built in a way that allows it to be easily expanded in the future and also be used for other sports such as rugby.
Johnson says the stadium, which will eventually be accompanied by a residential and commercial development, will be the catalyst for additional investment into downtown Pawtucket, and that by having a soccer-specific stadium makes all the difference to fan experience as the stadium doesn't have a single bad sightline. He says playing in big NFL stadiums nearly killed Major League Soccer, and that the league's fortunes started to turn when teams like Columbus Crew built soccer-specific stadiums.
But the Centreville Bank Stadium has one more trick up its sleeve. Its prime riverside location means fans will soon be able to arrive to games from Newport or Providence by boat, in something Johnson has dubbed 'sailgating.' It's sure to be a big hit.
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