Catie Cheshire
Audio By Carbonatix
Denver is closer to welcoming another major professional sports team, the Summit, with single-game tickets for the new women’s soccer team going on sale on Wednesday, November 13.
The Mile High City is full of great fans who can’t get enough sports. The Summit will play its first National Women’s Soccer League match in about five months, and that gives Denver’s die-hard, altitude-dizzy fans time to become the first generation of Summit fans.
The tickets that went on sale are for the “kickoff” match, the Summit’s first home match, at Empower Field on March 28. Prices range from $34 to $160, according to Ticketmaster.
So many developments have come down the pike about the Summit’s new and temporary stadiums, its players and upcoming season. If you’re interested in reaching the Summit this year, here’s what an aspiring fan needs to know.
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Welcome to the NWSL
The Denver Summit is among the newest teams in the NWSL, which has been around since 2012 and is rapidly growing. The league added two teams for the 2024 season as well.
The NWSL added the Summit alongside Boston Legacy FC, with news of Denver’s team coming out in January. On Tuesday, November 11, the league announced it would also expand into Atlanta in the 2027 season, its seventeenth team.
The Summit is owned by a group of local and national investors, including former Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning and Olympic skier Mikaela Shiffrin. The controlling owner is Rob Cohen, the CEO of the Denver-based IMA Financial Group,
Where Will the Summit Play in 2026?
The first home match for the Denver Summit, on March 28, will be at Empower Field, the home of the Denver Broncos. After that, the team’s temporary home will be in a temporary 12,000-seat stadium in Centennial, where the team plans to build a training facility. The stadium will go on to host state tournament games for various Colorado high school sports, as well.
The Summit’s permanent home is planned for an area off South Broadway and Interstate 25, and will cost about $300 million to build. The City of Denver is considering spending $70 million, including $50 million for land acquisition and $20 million for infrastructure improvements around the stadium, despite a budget shortfall that caused layoffs and harsh cuts. A Denver City Council committee delayed a vote on funding the new stadium and asked for more details about how the money will be spent before bringing the agreement back for a vote on December 10.
What Will the 2026 Season Look Like?
Two weeks of pre-season for the NWSL will be held from February 7 to 21 in Indio, California, where the Coachella music festival is held.
The NWSL season will open on February 20 with the Challenge Cup, which isn’t part of the regular season but is an official NWSL competition. Only the winner of the past NWSL championship and the team with the best regular season record play in the Challenge Cup.
The first 2026 regular season match will be on March 13. Each team will play thirty matches, but full-season schedules haven’t been released yet. The Summit hasn’t announced any opponents for its upcoming matches yet.
In 2026, the U.S., Mexico and Canada will host the FIFA Men’s World Cup, and nearly half of the sixteen cities with NWSL teams will be hosting World Cup games, including Houston, Los Angeles and New York. The NWSL will be taking a break through most of June to avoid competing.
Who Plays for the Denver Summit?
The Summit has announced a few signings so far, all of them of players on loan from another team, so they’ll only be in Denver temporarily before returning to their host clubs.
Colorado Springs native Ally Watt is likely the most notable player. She grew up in Colorado Springs, went to Pine Creek High School, played for the Texas A&M Aggies, the Melbourne City Women’s Football Club in Australia and then the North Carolina Courage in the NWSL.
For the past three seasons, the 28-year-old forward played for the Orlando Pride, but the Denver Summit announced the team signed her as its first official player in August. Watt is on loan from Orlando, though.
Spanish soccer player Nahikari Garcia will join Watt as a forward. The Summit announced the “top-flight” goalscorer as its first international signing in September. She’s signed through the next two years, and is on loan from Nottingham Forest Women FC in England.
The Denver Summit also signed midfielder Lourdes Bosch, a 24-year-old with experience playing for the University of Las Vegas and internationally for Melbourne City (after Watt was there), and in Monterrey, Mexico. Bosch is on loan from the C.F. Monterrey Femenil in Mexico.
On Thursday, November 13, the team announced the signing of “ironwoman” defender Kaleigh Kurtz, a two-time NWSL championship winner from the North Carolina Courage. The 31-year-old Kutz signed a three-year deal to make the Summit her host club.
How to Rep Like a Summit Fan
The Summit isn’t selling jerseys on their official website yet like other NWSL teams, but they do have shirts, sweaters and caps with the team’s official colors: alpine green, sunset yellow and snow white. Most of the gear available now is green and white, so fans who went to Colorado State University can probably get away with wearing the Rams gear at Summit matches.
The team already has official social media accounts on Instagram, X and Facebook, where it posts about signings, ticket sales and other team news.
Fans can also pay $52.80 to become a Club 5280 member. Most of the remaining tickets for the Summit’s first home match are only for Club 5280 members to buy, and they’re located closer to the field (or pitch, as it’s called in soccer).
