Phoenix Rising still chasing first 2026 league win

A poor opening half hour saw Phoenix Rising lose 2-0 on the road to Sacramento Republic.

Goals from Blake Willey and Dominik Wanner put the hosts ahead early, as Phoenix slumped to a fifth-straight league game without a win to open up the 2026 season.

Another slow Phoenix Rising start

Phoenix Rising hasn’t looked best in the early exchanges for most of this season, and their match in Sacramento proved no different.

A poor early performance saw Sacramento score twice before Phoenix even recorded a single shot. Republic gained possession within Rising’s third of the field on four separate occasions in the first half, producing wave after wave of pressure that Rising’s back line struggled to deal with.

The hosts could have added to Rising’s misery further, had referee Muhammad Hassan pointed to the spot after an early challenge on Arturo Rodriguez that appeared to be a stonewall penalty. Sacramento also put the ball into the back of the net off a first half corner, though this effort was disallowed and a retake ordered by the referee.

Improved, but not enough

After conceding a second goal, Phoenix Rising finally started to show signs of improvement, but rarely threatened Danny Vitiello in the Sacramento net until after the half-time break.

Across the second half, Rising did outshoot Sacramento by a large margin, creating 1.3 expected goals (xG) while boasting nearly 72 percent of possession. Ihsan Sacko, who replaced Gunnar Studenhofft at half-time, recorded three chances created.

However, some of Phoenix’s second half threat could also have been created thanks to Sacramento’s more reserved approach to play, and ultimately, the visitors could not find the breakthrough that they needed.

Injuries and minutes add up

Sacramento Republic entered Saturday’s match with an additional day of rest than their opponents, and unlike Phoenix Rising, they hadn’t needed to rely on extra time in midweek to get the job done.

The result of the added midweek minutes on a thin Phoenix Rising squad was only compounded by an illness for Rafael Czichos and an injury to Juan Carvajal, even as full-back Daniel Flores returned to the matchday squad.

In the second half, center-back Aleksandar Vuković had to leave the match after a clash of heads with Sacramento’s Forster Ajago saw him receive medical treatment on the field.

Owain’s Take

Last week, as young Rees filled in for me, he referenced none other than the 1993 movie Groundhog Day.

As the game progressed today, I started to wonder if we’d be reliving the same match yet again. They started poorly. They found their footing. They showed fight. They worked their way back in.

But have no fear: this wasn’t yet another repeat of the last week, and the one before that, and the one before that. No, it was actually something worse.

It seemed inevitable, of course, that this club wouldn’t just come back week after week after week. At some stage, the hole that they dig for themselves will be the hole they find themselves in as the final whistle blows.

This wasn’t an easy game to go into for Rising. They’d played 120 minutes in Irvine on Wednesday, and had to take that squad up to Northern California to compete. There were several additions to the list of unavailable players, including Juan Carvajal and Rafael Czichos.

But that being so impactful showcases how thin this squad was going into the season. Take a look at the club’s website, and you’ll see it quite clearly: only eighteen senior outfield players, or nineteen if you include Jamison Ping. Several of those players are somewhat injury prone, and frankly, the club should have known that when constructing this roster.

The result was a substitutes bench tonight that featured just four senior players, of which one was a goalkeeper and another was making his first appearance off the bench of the year as he came back from injury himself. Combine that with the minutes that many of Rising’s players had under the legs on Wednesday, and it’s probably not a surprise that the late comeback couldn’t be pulled off.

That isn’t an excuse, though, because it was all foreseeable. Save for crashing out of the Open Cup, early season congestion was always a given, and this squad doesn’t seem to have the bodies to quite keep up with it. The fixtures are only going to continue to pile up, too, as we see yet another stretch of three games in eight days coming up very soon, including a long trip over to Miami.

Regardless, we’re now five games into the league schedule and Phoenix Rising hasn’t yet recorded a single win. In fact, if you include cup matches, the only game this side has won in 90 minutes came against San Ramon, an amateur team that plays its home games in a public park.

It may be too early for the pressure to be on, but failing to win is not a habit this side wants to get into.

And facing New Mexico next week, at home? If Phoenix still can’t find a way to pick up three points, the stands are not going to be happy.

Top image: Sacramento Republic FC