Rapids Fall, 2-1, to Sporting Kansas City

Sports stats

MLS Colorado Rapids

Rapids Fall, 2-1, to Sporting Kansas City

July 4, 2025 - Major League Soccer (MLS)
Colorado Rapids News Release


DICK'S Sporting Goods Park | Commerce City, CO

Mixed Zone:

- Forward Calvin Harris

- Forward Kimani Stewart-Baynes

- Midfielder Connor Ronan

Notables:

- F Rafael Navarro netted his seventh goal and his first penalty kick goal of season.

- F Kimani Stewart-Baynes made his first appearance since the team's May 3 match against D.C. United.

The Big Picture

The Colorado Rapids (7-9-5, 26 points, 8th in the West) fell 2-1 to Sporting Kansas City (6-10-5, 23 points, 10th in the West) at DICK'S Sporting Goods Park. The Rapids now turn their attention to a midweek road trip, taking on LAFC at BMO Stadium on Wednesday, July 9, at 8:30 p.m. MT. They'll then return to DICK'S Sporting Goods Park for a quick turnaround, hosting the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday, July 12, at 7:30 p.m. MT.

COLORADO RAPIDS HEAD COACH CHRIS ARMAS

Opening remarks... "The first thing I would say, and it's been on my mind, in the football world with Diogo Jota, it's just worth mentioning. Our club is with that family and understanding how their world has been turned upside down. The whole footballing community in Portugal and Liverpool, we stand with them. We are really fortunate to do what we do and have our health. We are just with that family, that tragedy.

On tonight's game, I'm proud of the way the team fought and stuck with it. However, like I tell them, our challenge is going to be to continue to get good at the things that win you games, and getting better at avoiding the things that can cost you games. Last game, you can say it's a penalty late in the 86th minute. Tonight, it's an early goal that we gift Kansas City. And the goals just makes it more difficult. The other team grows a bit, they can waste more time. As every team comes in our building, they just completely waste time, and it's frustrating, but it's a reality we have to face as we try to put teams in fast games. So again, trying to avoid these types of little mishaps, I think is a big thing. We miss a penalty on the night, that hurts you in turn trying to get the result. But if we're being honest, the big takeaway for me is the way the team pushed and stuck with it and created chances, and had discipline. Just in a mature way, we actually pushed and pushed. We created lots of chances, probably a high XG, I didn't look at it yet. On the night, it didn't feel like we conceded a whole lot. So, in terms of the victory, it's not ours tonight. I think these things we're going to keep learning from these games, but the overall performance is something we can probably feel good about."

On the chance creation on the night... When teams sit deep, it's very difficult to create chances and to find the space when there is not a lot. We talk a lot about, start doing, stop doing, continue doing things. This is a continue to do. If you had 25 shots and a high XG, it's probably keep doing that. That's it in terms of the offense; the margins are close. I think we create a lot of chances. I'd say, let's continue to do that stuff. I think there's little things as we're chasing at the end, if we could have a little more discipline to have the width and we can talk about little tactical things. Overall, in terms of creating chances, I think it's a continue to do for our offense."

On coachable moments for young players... "When you coach a young team, it's helpful if you have a patient coach and organization. And we all do, we understand that there's a curve that happens, and it doesn't come right away. We don't play the blame game around here, and it's never one moment or play, whether it's New England or tonight. There's lots of moments we can do a little bit better. The message to our team and my team is we think there's room. I talk about just like a belt, just one or two more notches to tighten the grip in almost everything we do. It's this idea of the marginal gains, one percent better at everything, and that the collective and the sum of all that makes the difference. I think that's where we're at. But there is this, there is this thing about not giving away games. We know that most games are lost, not won, so we have to get better at not giving it away. I think that's maybe an example tonight. But again, the big takeaway is for me, on a very special night, Fourth of July, our fans came out big. We wanted to give them a little more to cheer about. I think they saw a team that played proactive football in many ways. We stuck to ourselves. I think again, a little more intensity, a little more sprinting, a little bit more controlling moments and being sharper in moments. It's going to come. It's there for us. It's there for us."

On being able to capitalize in key moments... "The key word that you said there is 'yet.' On another night, maybe you score four or five tonight. I think you do. Again, it's, how do you overcome it? Well, we score a penalty. We miss a penalty. We hit the post. They hit it a little more this way. It's just in the margins. The key for us is to get better at who we are in all phases of the game from in possession, transition moments, direct play. Tonight, they get a goal from just a little scramble. We're a team that relies on a style of play that's very clear and distinct, so there's room there. So again, sprinting, more intensity, more verticality. That team didn't try to play through us tonight. They didn't. You got to give them credit. They came here and got a result. T e way we get it is to stick with it and be better at who we are. And then ultimately, each box is where it's determined. We got to get better in each box, especially just not giving it away."

On Connor Ronan's performance in tonight's match... "It's really what I've liked from Connor [Ronan] in a year and a half. I value the player, and I appreciate the player. We just have chosen to go with Oliver [Larraz] and Josh [Atencio] in a lot of the games. What we really appreciate in Conor Ronan's game is what you saw tonight, if we think we're going to have the ball more, and how the team's going to sit back, which we thought we could push them back at home on this night, hat guy that is clever on the ball, can see forward passes, his range of passing. You see how many balls he played behind chance creation. He progresses the ball among the best in our team. Some days, sets up more for transition games. We choose different types of profiles in sixes. The key is that the best part is that we have different profiles that we can lean on. I think Connor did a lot for the team tonight and himself, if I'm being honest. I thought he had a great game."

On Cole Bassett coming in as a substitute... "Before the game, we got to think about are we starting Cole [Basset] in some position. At two-nil with a sold out crowd, you decide, do you want to keep going the way you're going, or do you want to spark it with energetic guys that have goals in them, fresh, hungry. That was the decision. That was it. It's not anti-Ku [Ted Ku-DiPiertro]. It's get Cole Bassett going and at that stage, both sixes were, I thought, important in the moment, and Calvin Harris was still dangerous."

On who takes penalties throughout a match... "Djordje [Mihailovic] has been the guy who has scored a lot of penalties for us and so has Rafa [Navarro]. Those are the two guys that we practice with in training. Djordje would be the one that stepped up initially, and Rafa is the second. We do talk about it. We make the decision ahead of time. And as much as you pre plan that, there's different moments that different guys, those two guys can...whether it's confidence or certain feeling a guy's having. It kind of went as planned. It's the one two punch there."

On Nico Hansen's performance in goal and Zack Steffen injury update... "Zack [Steffen], he's been our number one, and that's his position. Nothing's ever a given around here. You got to earn it, but I think Zack has left off in a good way, and he's going to come back in a good way. When that is, I'm not quite sure, it's getting close. Nico [Hansen] has been tremendous for us. If you added up all the good things he's done and how much he has saved us, there's gonna be moments that get away. I'm not even sure, if you look closely at it, did everything else around him execute? We had a plan of which we were going to build out of the back on goal kicks, so I got to look closer at that. But if Nico Hansen's name comes, I think we better say, just pretty much be in awe of how he has stepped in and delivered for us. He's been amazing."

COLORADO RAPIDS DEFENDER KEEGAN ROSENBERRY

Opening remarks... "More than anything, we let the fans down. It's such an awesome event that the club puts on. The people always turn out, everything about the production of this match on the Fourth since my time here has been one of my favorite fixtures. To get to play tonight - I thanked Reggie [Cannon] after the result in New England for the timing of that. I'm just disappointed. Looking at the stats, it's a convincing game. The way our attack generates chances and then the way that the game goes. It's very difficult to go down early on a mistake, and I hold my hand up on the second goal. I don't like when guys after the game will say, 'Hey, this was my fault, or this was my fault.' That play on the second goal that came down to being stronger and putting in more of a challenge on that first long ball. That's more frustrating sometimes than a team picking you apart and having a really nice play and showing real quality. That combined with only allowing, I've heard four shots on the night, it's unfortunate. This sport can be cruel sometimes and the stats don't tell the full story. The message in the locker room is that if we keep playing games like that, we're going to come out on the right side of the results. Tonight was not one of those unfortunately."

On mistakes made during the match and learning opportunities... "Believe it or not, we proved it tonight. An early mistake and we concede in a way that obviously no one expected and that first half we looked like ourselves. We pushed the game, I thought we generated a lot of chances. We could have scored a couple at the end of the half. Djordje [Mihailovic] hits the deflection, post straight and across the goal. We had a couple of moments tonight where it's not falling our way. I was really proud of that. We can concede the second goal and continue to push. It didn't look like those mistakes; those moments in the match affected our mindset. That's what you want. That, as leaders, as people that are trying to push the team in the right direction, I can't ask for much more. Again, the result and the moments to change the game, of course, but I was happy with that performance."

On Jackson Travis' performance... "He's done really well with the opportunities this year. Him and [Darren] Yapi, have looked so much more mature in their performances and well rounded. It's not just young guys using their athleticism to make plays at certain times. I think they have a head on their shoulders. They're making the right decisions. At times they're challenging the guys in front of them to play and that's how teams push each other. That depth is important, especially when you enter other competitions. The League's Cup is coming up and things like that. The match congestion that we'll have in the next couple weeks with midweek matches. I thought he [Jackson Travis] was good again tonight. You forget how young these guys are sometimes. I know I do in the way that I interact with them, I don't really even think about their age sometimes, maybe to a fault. But that's a special thing about sports. You can have a collection of 18 to 35-year-olds, and everybody has the same common goal. That's what's fun about it. Hopefully we help them with leadership and by example, but I think they've got great heads on their shoulders. They push themselves. They're self-motivated, and I've been proud and happy for them to see the progress."

On the upcoming stretch of matches... "You're not lying. It's a difficult stretch of games: away to LAFC, home to Vancouver, away to Seattle. Even the games we had just played. The Galaxy match at home. Of course, it looks like we have to win that game. You get a weather delay, not many people in the stands. Some factors that you are up against are difficult. I think we come out and show a really good, mature, professional performance. The last two hurt. In New England is a tough one to swallow, and tonight was just, like I explained with my opening statements, really difficult to feel like you're pushing the match and just not getting the changing moments to get the result. As far as messaging and in the way we approach this stretch, not to be cliche, but we got to focus on one at a time. LAFC has been a really difficult place for us to play. I think the last time we went there, we were really happy with the first half. We concede late in the first half, and then the second half is, I think we're chasing, and it gets, for a lack of a better term, ugly, as sometimes it does there. I thought the way that we approached that match last time it looked and felt much more competitive. I like our ideas going into that. And then from there, it's not even really worth thinking about the next ones. We gotta see what that match looks like. We gotta see what the rotation looks like. How guys, you recover. The travel and the recovery is really challenging. Especially from the Wednesday to Saturday, with one less day. You get back 3 a.m. on the Wednesday, you've got an off day or a recovery day and the next day, then it's two days after the game where guys usually feel worse after playing 90 minutes, now you got to train because it's the day before the game. It's really tough. This is where the depth that I talked about it, if we can get guys pushing each other from a couple at each spot, those are the best teams. You look at the teams at the top of the league, they've got guys pushing each other. They can rotate, they can still look like themselves, Wednesday, Saturday, Wednesday, Saturday. It'll be hard. I'm not shying away from that. It'l be good for us. It'll be a good challenge."

- ColoradoRapids.com | @ColoradoRapids -

Check out the Colorado Rapids Statistics



Major League Soccer Stories from July 4, 2025


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

Other Recent Colorado Rapids Stories



Sports Statistics from the Stats Crew
OurSports Central