Palmetto State Report - Interview with Greenville Triumph General Manager Zach Prince
- Forrest Wimberly
- Jun 25
- 9 min read
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Zach Prince knows South Carolina soccer. Growing up in Irmo, South Carolina, Prince was a standout player at Irmo High School and part of the USYSA Region 3 player pool before taking his skills to the College of Charleston for his collegiate career. After college, Prince signed a professional contract with the Charleston Battery and played his home matches in the soccer’specific Blackbaud Stadium on Daniel Island from 2010 to 2016 winning the USL Championship title in 2012.
After his playing days were complete, Prince gained USL Championship coaching experience with New Mexico United, and then later, MLS experience with DC United before ultimately coming back home to the Palmetto State in his new role as General Manager of the USL One Greenville Triumph.
Prince knows South Carolina soccer. Prince knows the USL landscape. Prince knows what a specific soccer stadium means to South Carolina after playing his professional days at one in Charleston. Prince knows the direction he wants to take the Greenville Triumph and the Greenville Liberty in the Upstate.
The Palmetto State report was able to catch up with Mr. Prince just before kickoff at the first match inside the brand-new home of the Triumph, GE Renova Park at Bridgeway. Here is what he had to say about the new stadium, the goals and ambitions of the franchise, and how all this fits in and ever-changing soccer landscape, not only in South Carolina, but in the United States.
Since you played in a specific soccer stadium with the Battery, what this means to have this new stadium here in the Upstate?
“That’s why I came back (to South Carolina), said Prince. “I coached in USL and MLS for a good period of time and the reason I came back was that I wanted to really raise my family in South Carolina, and raising my family in South Carolina (in a location) where a club was taking themselves places and really wanted to push the limits on what that looks like. And in the scope of US soccer, they (Triumph) don't limit themselves. We don't limit ourselves because we're in the USL. We're looking to push the limits. And so I'm so excited about that.”
This is great for the Triumph and USL1, but what does this also mean for the Liberty?
“It means we're gonna push the limits for the Liberty, too,” said Prince. “We have some exciting news coming up on that, but we're looking at a way to provide really positive outcomes and professional outcomes for girls in the state of South Carolina.”
With the Liberty playing USL U20 Academy this year, are they returning to the USL W League in 2027?
“We'll see. We'll see,” said Prince with a huge smile and a nod to something else. “Or maybe…it'll maybe beyond…maybe beyond (the USL W-League into the USL Super League).”
What will this stadium will do to attract new transfers to the team?
“I think there's two things to it,” said Prince. “First, Greenville already attracts people because it's such an amazing city. It's such a great city for people to either raise families or be a young professional. It's a really cool place to live where you can really do so many different things. So that's a big piece of it, but the other piece of it is, us owning our own stadium shows what direction we want to take this club. I've only been here for a short amount of time, and in that short amount of time, it's allowed me to evaluate what's needed for 2027 and beyond, and I'm super excited about what we have to come.”
After the first match at GE Vernova Park was completed, Calum Ewing followed up with Zach Prince to ask some additional questions.
All right, let's go ahead and talk about the season's performance so far. You’ve had slightly underwhelming performances. Obviously, you’ve still been even more of a nomadic club than you have in the past, going through multiple home venues, playing mostly away from home; now that you're settling in, you'll have a good stretch of games. But, you're below the playoff line, even with the win tonight (June 3, 1-0 over Forward Madision), you have some work to do with your games in hand to catch up to the other USL1 teams.
What are your expectations for the rest of the year with the current squad?
“I think for us, we really want to look at our performances, game over game, and make sure we're continuing to get better. We had a great performance away at Portland Heart of Pines, which I think they're a top club and not even just on the field, but just the top club from an organization standpoint. And so really looking at, you know, that performance and then having a little bit of a letdown in Knox, which they do a great job on the field. Then, coming back and really being able to have a top end performance here and a really gritty performance, really a defend 1st, manufacturing quality chances, but the fight and will to make sure we're going to win the game was the most important piece.
“So saying all that, as long as we're building on each performance and making sure there's some consistency of us moving forward, that’s what I'm looking towards. I’m not looking towards the playoff line or where we're going to finish. I look game every game over game, training over training session. That's where we're at.”
That kind of ties into the next question. After missing the playoffs for the 1st time in club history last year, you are in a rebuilding year. It’s not even retooling, it is a rebuild. You’ve been brought in. Dixon's been brought as the new head coach. How long do you think it will take for this club to return to the level of computing for championships like they did in their 1st 3 seasons?
“I think with that, there's obvious answers to that, which would be transfer windows, and when transfer windows come, there's going to be a little bit of a turnover in the roster. But saying that, we believe that this roster can achieve a playoff spot. We’re not shying away from that. I'm looking at building championships.
“It's really about sustainability, and when I say sustainability, It means making sure that we have a solid roster, but we're not changing over 60 or 70% per season. We're looking at a high retention rate. If you look at the great clubs in USL, I was part of one at Charleston Battery, we had a core group of players. I won a couple championships there as a player. We had a core group of players that stayed for a really long time. You look at Louisville City, they do the same thing. Detroit City has started to do the same thing. Charleston has started to do that again. Tampa, they just flipped their roster and you're going to see them with some consistency for a long period of time.
“So you're seeing teams that do a really good job of building a core group of players that can sustain and then tweaking that 25%, you know, year over year and you're not tweaking changing 60 or 70 or 80% of your roster year over year.”
What would your mentality be going into this summer transfer window? Are there any positions of need that you're focused on hitting or is it more of a depth focus?
“No, we're always looking, and I don't think we're going to change over our roster in the summer, but at the same time, if we can improve our roster, we will. I mean, there's not obviously a financial constraint to that, but saying that our owners understand that they want to be extremely competitive and they're really excited about the direction that we're headed. We just gotta be smart.”
Let’s about attendance just very briefly. The club has a pretty decent average. Right now, it's 1734, I believe, before this match, and you're moving into a new home, higher capacity, more hype behind the club. How much consistency will there really be in an attendance average compared to the rest of the league to elevate the Triumph to another level and compared to other USL1 clubs?
“Let me say this. There's 3 things that come to mind. First is a genuine connection with the community, so they know that we are not just a transactional club that looks to just go and win. You always come to us. You watch us, we're just entertainment. There's a genuine connection where we go out and we go out to Title schools and have a Train Like Triumph program We have a Unified team where we coach people with intellectual disabilities. We have our U20s program that's completely paid for, no financial barrier to enter; so, there's a genuine connection with us in the community.
“The 2nd thing is the fan experience in making sure that the fans know every time they come to a game that we're thinking about them. It's not a transactional moment where we just think, hey, you paid for your seat, that's all, we're really looking at how can we enhance the entertainment value of what they're experiencing each day, each game that they come.
“And the last piece of that is the performance and making sure that it's very entertaining, high octane, fun. And they know that everyone on the field is giving their all. People can connect with that. Especially people in Greenville, especially if people agree with that. I've been here for a long time and seen this city triumph over so much throughout their time that they've been here. So as long as we keep doing that, we’re gonna build a genuine connection and we're gonna win some championships here coming soon.”
You spoke to Forrest a little bit about this, but the other team that this community is really back against the Greenville Liberty. There is a U20 team, but the club is on hiatus from the USLW perspective, and speaking with front office members in Greenville in the past, there has been a desire to, a stated desire, in fact, publicly to one day join the USL Super League.
When you spoke to Forrest and he asked about rejoining USLW, you said, well, think bigger and better. Is there any, I know maybe there's announcements or stuff that has to be done, but is there anything you can say about the Liberty’s future in regards to professional soccer?
“What I would say is first, you mentioned that we didn't have the Liberty team this year for the W League, and what's important for you to understand about that, and everyone to understand about that, is we ended up saying, ‘Hey, how are we gonna put the most resources into the girls that are here in the upstate?’
“And so, we decided to take away the W-League team, which is a college-based team, and we decided to take those resources and put them into the girls that are right here in our community. So, resources were reallocated, they weren't taken away. That’s really important for us to all understand when we were talking about the Liberty. That was a very calculated decision.
The second piece of that is because we are building for something bigger. We are building something beyond what the W- League was. Saying all those things, no, there's not an announcement that I'm gonna tell you right now, but that is in our future.
USL Premier, it’s been stated that, I mean, if everything goes bullish, next year potentially, but more realistically in 2028, there would be a promotion relegation system. When you were talking to Forrest as well, you kind of spoke about that you wanted to be playing at the highest level the USL offered in 2027. That's next year. I don't know, again, if you're allowed to speak on anything regarding the USL's implementation of promotion and relegation, but would those comments hint at the Greenville Triumph promoting themselves to the USL Championship or just playing at your level and then trying to raise yourselves up?
“Yeah, I wasn't trying to be cute with anything like that. What I think, though, is in 2028 when promotion relegation comes in, we want to be a team that is challenging for championships in the league that we're in and also promotion in that league. What I won't do is make reactionary decisions based off of a couple results to throw money at things that might get us a quick fix, but might lose sustainability for us in looking into 2028 and what that could be, 2027 as well, in 2028.
“And so we have 3 transfer windows when we’re in the offseason. We have 3 transfer windows of that where we can build towards 2028 and make sure that we're not having to change over the roster coming into that year. Then, if we get promoted, we’re not looking at, hey, we have to change over the roster again once we get promoted.
“This is, for me, very methodical, and very calculated in the decisions that we're making to make sure that we not only are very competitive, we get the right people in the door, but we’re sustainable. That's really important to me.”
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