It was April 13, 2024. The Colorado Springs Switchbacks had just lost their fifth straight game to start the season, and they had been outscored 9-1 over that stretch.
Fast forward seven months, and the Switchbacks won the USL Championship at Weidner Field. Fast forward another four months, and the team has a chance to accomplish something no USL team has done since 2018: Repeat as champions.
The first step: Start the season better.
“We’re trying to leave 2024 in 2024. It’s a new season and a new group, with different teams in the league,” says Head Coach James Chambers. “There’s a lot of unknowns with how the season will pan out. But the players will take the experience from last year — and the fact of how the season started — in terms of resilience.”
It was the sixth game of the 2024 season, a 1-1 draw against Indy Eleven, that proved to be an important turning point.
“We scored early and then defended really well, which hadn’t been happening. We fought through it,” says Sporting Director Stephen Hogan. “We knew it was going to be a hard game and needed a foothold on something for Oakland.”
After a week of training Hogan called “ferocious at times,” Colorado Springs then went on the road and beat the Oakland Roots 2-0. Then the Switchbacks went unbeaten over the next seven games.
“Those two weeks gave us something to carry,” Hogan says.
And at the end of the season, the team carried the USL trophy around Weidner Field. But it’s a clean slate for 2025, with eight new players on the roster.
Keys for a New Season
“It’s a new group overall, even the returning players are slightly different,” says Chambers. “The group is really committed and ready to do the work. They’re saying and doing the right things so far.”
The new year doesn’t mean the Switchbacks’ identity or style of play — with and without the ball — will change. A well-structured defense (key to the 2024 turnaround), improved execution on offense and a well-executed aggressive pressing style, especially at home, will be key in 2025.
“We’re not trying to have a complete overhaul, but we do need to evolve,” Chambers says. “We need to be better in possession, be more deliberate with our attacks in the final third in particular. We left goals on the table last year. And, of course, we have to balance that with keeping clean sheets.”
The 34-game USL season can be broken into three parts: the excitement of the start, the hot and humid grind of the summer months and the burst of energy that comes with the playoff push. Amid those ebbs and flows, the Switchbacks have specific goals for each.
“We want to come out of summer grind in conversation for the playoffs,” Chambers says. “That’s really the business end of the season when the top players show up.”
Turning defeats into draws, and draws into wins, can have an important effect on both the standings and the players throughout the season.
“The confidence and belief go through the roof when that happens,” says Hogan. “Staying in every game is a champion’s mentality.”
The business end of the campaign can be crucial. Last year, Colorado Springs went 5-2-2 in the final nine games, and the team jumped multiple spots in the standings on the final day of the season, helping to secure that all-important home playoff game. In 2025, six of the final nine games will be in the friendly confines of Weidner Field, where the Switchbacks are 29-12-10 over the past three seasons.
Home Team Advantage
The support and loyalty of the fans — for the team, staff and organization — plays a critical role in the team’s home success, according to Chambers.
“It’s important that the fans continue to do that because they’re who we do it for,” he says. “The energy in the building — we have one of the best stadiums in the league. The energy is so infectious for us as a group. It gives us more impetus for our play.”
While the altitude of Colorado Springs plays a part, Hogan says that the pressing style of the Switchbacks — and how well executed it is — is often the thing that worries opposing teams the most.
“I wouldn’t want to play us at home,” Hogan says. “Especially when that belief is soaring through the players. Sometimes you think you can deal with the press … and then the press happens.”
As defending champions, Hogan knows that a target will be on the Switchbacks every week.
“Obviously, people are coming for us. People don’t like the champs. We’ll get an extra 10% from everyone,” he says. “The question is: Can this new roster group work off that to motivate both the new guys and themselves? The first game or two will show us a lot.”
The Switchbacks home opener is Saturday, March 15 against Detroit City FC, and the game will feature a celebration of the team’s championship. Get details, tickets, info on all the promo games at switchbacksfc.com.
Switchbacks Welcome New Leadership
The Switchbacks front office also saw changes in the offseason. Weidner Apartment Homes, a minority partner in the team since 2020, assumed full ownership of the team, buying out the remaining share of the business from the founding Ed Ragain family. Additionally, the Switchbacks Board of Directors appointed Brad Estes, former president of Louisville City FC and Racing Louisville FC, as the new team president.
“My family and I are ecstatic to become the newest members of the Colorado Springs community,” Estes says. “From the very first meeting, it was clear that the board and I are aligned on culture, the most important part of any organization.”
Estes, who was at Louisville City FC from 2016 to 2022, was an integral part to their back-to-back championships in 2017-18, the last USL team to achieve that feat.
“The Ragain family has done an incredible job building Switchbacks FC into what it is today, one of the elite clubs in the USL Championship,” he says. “I look forward to building on that tradition, working collaboratively with our staff, players, supporters, sponsors and the community.”
Switchbacks Flashback: 10 Years Ago
The Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC narrowly missed reaching the USL championship game in the team’s inaugural season back in 2015. Read Switchbacks FC: Making the Team from our archives, one of our earliest articles about Colorado Springs’ professional soccer team.
