Theo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger.
In its inaugural season, Vermont Green FC’s women’s team has still not lost a match.
Following an unbeaten regular season, the squad has pushed on with two home playoff wins that saw them crowned conference champions on July 5 in front of a sold-out crowd in Burlington.
Now, the club is set to host a national semifinal at the University of Vermont’s Virtue Field on Saturday.
“Obviously it’s been a phenomenal start,” club co-founder Patrick Infurna said in an interview Monday. “It’s pretty rare for an expansion team to be able to make this kind of impact in its first season.”
Vermont Green FC was founded in 2022, and its men’s team has seen growing success in the United Soccer League’s second tier. After a playoff run in 2024 was cut short, the Green were crowned undefeated national champions last year. This year, the men’s regular season is again off to an undefeated start.
The club organized several women’s exhibition matches in its initial years, drawing strong support and featuring FIFA Women’s World Cup winner Sam Mewis as the squad’s coach. Last October, the club announced plans to create a permanent women’s team in the USL W, a 96-team nationwide women’s summer league largely featuring collegiate players.
“We felt prepared,” Infurna said of the move. “The community was asking for it.”
The team has answered in no uncertain terms.
The newly assembled women in green clinched first place in the Northeast division late last month before dispatching the Long Island Rough Riders 3-0 in a conference playoff game in Burlington on Friday.
Sunday’s conference final promised a struggle: The Green were facing off against four-time Mid-Atlantic champions Eagle FC. But Tess Barrett and Violet Rademacher each found the net to power their new club to a conference title.
Rademacher, who plays for the University of Portland during the academic year, said in an interview that her goal Sunday was “such an amazing feeling.” According to a club release, the whipped left-footed finish makes her the club’s joint top goal scorer so far this season — from central defense.
Abby Carchio, the team’s head coach, told VTDigger that while expectations are difficult to establish in a team’s first season, winning the division had always been her “north star.” Individual player quality — which, she said, her squad offers in spades — has combined with club camaraderie and community backing to allow for this early success.
Nonetheless, Carchio and her players are intent on continuing to win.
“I’m probably the most competitive person I know,” she said.
Robust fan support, which Infurna called the club’s “defining feature,” has largely transferred to the women’s side. Virtue Field’s 2,500-seat bleachers have been sold out for nearly every game this season, and a distinct supporters’ culture is forming around the women’s team, Infurna said.
“I’ve been in a lot of footballing environments in my life, and this is the No. 1 I’ve experienced when it comes to supporters,” added Carchio, who earlier in her career played for professional clubs across Europe.
Such enthusiasm has been a factor in the Green securing home playoff berths, Infurna added. The club hosted its men’s team’s entire postseason run last year and has been awarded three women’s playoff matches already this season.
Infurna sees the community’s warm reception to the new side as a local manifestation of the global growth in women’s soccer over recent years.
“We’re seeing a version of the national enthusiasm — the international enthusiasm — for women’s soccer here in Vermont,” he said. “It’s a privilege.”
Rademacher agreed, saying that her team’s support has visibly grown even over the course of this season. For her and Carchio, Vermont Green’s success in engaging its community could be a model for other local teams — and other fans — across the county.
“I know everybody’s going to be there supporting us all,” Rademacher said of Saturday’s semifinal game. “We want to give them a show.”
