Burke, Hartford Set to Begin 2024 Slate With Saturday Night Battle in El Paso

The USL Championship's opening weekend is finally upon us, and a new-look Hartford Athletic are looking to finally put an ugly 2023 campaign in the rearview mirror.

Image courtesy of Hartford Athletic

Following the acquisition of a new Chief Executive Officer, brand new coaching staff and more than 20 new players, it seems foolish to compare a barely-recognizable Hartford Athletic to the team that was just two losses from the worst finish in league history last season.

For the fans, though, a miserable 2023 will be fresh in their memory as a new-look Hartford squad in search of only their second postseason berth in club history will start their 2024 season in El Paso on Saturday. A 5-3 season-opening loss on the road in Monterey Bay set the tone for Tab Ramos’ Athletic in 2023 — if what we saw in preseason holds true, a similar result isn’t completely out of the picture for Brendan Burke in his return to the USL Championship sidelines.

In total, Hartford’s new-look attack notched an impressive 13 goals across five preseason games, which comes as no surprise given the attacking firepower Burke brought in the offseason. With the likes of well-known league veterans Marcus Epps, Enoch Mushagalusa, Deshane Beckford, Romario Williams and Michee Ngalina, to name a few — the latter of which was named 2022 USL Young Player of the Year under Burke during Colorado’s first-ever Western Conference Final run — the Hartford attack promises to be deep, free-flowing and dynamic this season. Burke saw this potential come alive in a 6-2 win over New York Red Bulls II just weeks ago, the first of a two-game stretch that saw the Green and Blue find the back of the net nine times in two games to conclude preseason.

The concern comes on the defensive end for Hartford. It’s no secret that this was the pitfall of the team in 2023. They conceded a league-most 79 goals in 34 games last season, just shy of 2.5 per game.

In a much smaller five-game sample under Burke in the 2024 preseason, Hartford weren’t much better — nine conceded goals was good for a 1.8 goals allowed average, including a 3-3 draw with Philadelphia Union II that saw Hartford give up a pair of leads at home to close out their season preparations.

Hartford outscoring their opponents 13-9 in in preseason tells you all you need to know about the Green and Blue going into 2024. Burke’s Colorado Springs squad was infamous for conceding in large quantities and scoring even more. They conceded 56 and scored 64 in their Western Conference Final run in 2022, and that was enough to orchestrate a complete turnaround for the Western Conference side in his two-year stint with the club.

With an experienced club-record signing goalkeeper who’s last appearance was a red card in European competition nearly five years ago, the question of whether Renan Ribeiro is healthy and sharp will also play into Hartford’s defensive capabilities in 2024.

As for El Paso, they open their home slate looking for a replica of the 2-0 defeat they handed Hartford in late August at Trinity Health Stadium. The win snapped a 10-game winless streak and ultimately inspired a late-season resurgence that helped them sneak into the seventh-seed in the Western Conference, before ending their season with a 1-0 loss to Orange County SC in the first round of the playoffs.

El Paso finished at an even .500 overall in Brian Clarhaut’s first season in charge with a 13-13-8 record, despite scoring just 41 goals on the season — good for 20th in the league, and just one more than Hartford managed.

Similarly to Hartford, El Paso enter 2024 with a largely changed roster. They acquired a number of USL Championship veterans on both sides of the ball in the offseason, including former San Diego Loyal striker Tumi Moshobanecan and former Pittsburgh Riverhounds starting goalkeeper Jamali White. Mashobanecan’s 25 goals in four seasons for San Diego establish him as a dangerous USL goalscoring presence that Locomotive fans hope will help heal 2023’s scoring struggles, while White may be a familiar face to New England Revolution fans — one of his 20 clean sheets in two seasons with Pittsburgh came in his side’s 1-0 win over Bruce Arena’s Revs at Gillette Stadium in the fourth round of the 2023 U.S. Open Cup.

With a pair of coaches boasting fresh squads looking to re-establish themselves as true competitors within their respective conferences, Saturday’s battle will certainly be an interesting early-season test for both teams as the USL Championship enters yet another season. Kickoff from Southwest University Park in set for 9 p.m. ET on MyTV9, wtnh.com or ESPN+.