Utah News

A building that houses the Salt Lake City Immigration Court and the Immigrations and Custom Enforcement field office in Salt Lake City is pictured on Saturday, Nov. 15, 2025. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)

After years of waiting, several immigrants in Utah were just days or moments away from making their case for asylum in the United States. 

But before judges considered their arguments earlier this month, their cases were dealt a major blow, their attorneys said.  

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security filed motions to “pretermit” their cases, or dismiss them before the long-anticipated hearing and deport them to a “safe third country” where they don’t have ties to seek asylum there instead. 

“It’s a complete nightmare,” said South Jordan immigration attorney Carlos Trujillo. 

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Trujillo noted that in October, an immigration appeals board effectively ruled the burden is on immigrants to prove they are likely to be persecuted or tortured in the third country and therefore should be allowed to stay in the U.S. 

“There is no way to save the case, because there is no way to demonstrate that you will be persecuted in a country that you have never been in,” Trujillo said. 

But he will try anyway at upcoming hearings where he said he will have 15 minutes to make such a case on behalf of clients originally from Venezuela. 

It comes as the Trump administration carries out mass deportations and seeks to clear a backlog of asylum cases. More than 2 million immigrants are awaiting asylum hearings, according to Syracuse University’s TRAC database. 

The Department of Homeland Security did not respond to email requests for comment from Utah News Dispatch. It has previously said it is “using every lawful tool available to address the backlog and abuse of the asylum system.” It has also referred to “lawful bilateral arrangements” allowing unauthorized immigrants to seek legal protection in other nations that have agreed to adjudicate their claims.

The United States has a longstanding third-country agreement with Canada but signed more recent agreements with countries including Ecuador, Guatemala and Honduras.  

“They’re saying, ‘Hey, because we have the agreements with these countries, they’re not even eligible to apply for asylum here. Let’s ship them to Honduras or Ecuador and see if they’ll grant them asylum instead,’” said Utah immigration attorney Nicholle Pitt White.  

The government’s practice of filing “pretermission motions” intensified nationally in November after the appeals decision, with thousands filed. Use of the legal strategy seems to have started growing in Utah in recent weeks, according to Trujillo and Pitt White. 

The attorneys can count the number of cases in their offices on one or two hands, but suspect more are being filed. 

“It’s very possible they’ve done it in other cases where people don’t have attorneys, and we just wouldn’t hear those stories,” Pitt White said. 

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In and outside of Utah, lawyers are trying to get creative in how they fight against the maneuver. One argument, Pitt White said: The United States’ third-country agreement with Ecuador isn’t in full force because specific criteria for who will and will not be accepted under the accord hasn’t been set.  

Pitt White noted Ecuador has one of the highest homicide rates in South America and Honduras has in recent years had the highest rate of people fleeing and seeking asylum in the U.S. 

She believes one of her clients who’s currently being held in a detention center had a strong case before the change in the government’s strategy. 

“But because of the timing when this policy came out, the motion being filed, we got stuck in a bad spot for our client,” Pitt White said. “It feels kind of hopeless.”

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University of Utah freshman Landon Jakob just wanted to avoid sitting on a stationary bike all winter to stay in shape for his high school mountain bike racing team, when he first tried the newest Olympic sport, ski mountaineering, known as skimo to its fans.

“It was an easy ski with the team up by Guardsman Pass. I had stomach cramps the whole time. It was probably the hardest thing I’d ever done. I kind of wondered how I was going to be able to do it,” recalled Jakob, 18, a USA Skimo national team member.

What got him hooked on the historically European sport that’s set to debut next month at the 2026 Winter Games in Milan-Cortina, Italy, was the skimo community that’s developed in Utah. Mostly in their teens, they train hard but also have a lot of fun, Jakob said.

“We’re serious at times, for sure. But then we’ll also have practices that are like parties and we’ll wear costumes sometimes. It’s stuff like that, I think, that got me into it,” he said, describing competing in a winter solstice sprint race with disco balls and music while dressed as an elf.

Utah is already “the skimo capital of the U.S.”

—  Team USA skimo athlete Landon Jakob

Spending time in the backcountry has also become a big draw for Jakob. Skimo, which requires skiers to climb uphill with and without special skis before racing downhill, is based on military training for patrols in the Alps of Italy, Switzerland and France.

“There’s something about being about to choose your line up a mountain without any trails and just go ski where you want,” he said. “I got into it that year and I raced my first youth world cup right away at the end of that season and got on the national team.”

He and another national team member from the same Silverfork Skimo team in Salt Lake City, McCall Birkinshaw, also 18, see themselves as potential Team USA members when Utah hosts the 2034 Winter Games.

Both are counting on the coverage of skimo in Italy to raise awareness of their sport.

Skimo is all about “endurance, and downhill skills, and strategy and even skimo-specific transition skills. It’s all those elements that make it such a fun spectator sport. I think it’s a perfect fit.”

—  Team USA skimo athlete McCall Birkinshaw on the future of the sport

“We need more publicity in this sport, for sure,” said Birkinshaw, who graduated early from Skyline High School and plans to study medicine at the University of Utah. “It’s exciting. It feels like it’s about time, you know? This sport has been so small in the U.S. But it’s really had a breakthrough.”

That came at Solitude Mountain Resort, the site of December’s Salt Lake City Skimo World Cup. There, two Americans, newcomer Anna Gibson and Cameron Smith, unexpectedly won the season’s final mixed relay qualification event and are headed to Italy.

Birkinshaw describes skimo as the ideal Olympic sport, all about “endurance, and downhill skills, and strategy and even skimo-specific transition skills. It’s all those elements that make it such a fun spectator sport. I think it’s a perfect fit.”

Jakob said the opportunity for skimo at this year’s Olympics “will be huge.”

Utah is already “the skimo capital of the U.S.,” he said, as home to the national governing body for the sport, the U.S. Ski Mountaineering Association, also called USA Skimo, as well as the country’s biggest youth teams and about half the national team.

“I know a lot of people came up to that Solitude World Cup who had never heard of skimo and they watched it and thought it was the coolest, and the hardest, sport they had ever seen,” Jakob said. “I definitely think it deserves to stay in the Olympics.”

What new sports are coming to future Olympics?

But there’s no guarantee that skimo will be part of any future Winter Games beyond 2026.

That’s because skimo is among the sports added by the International Olympic Committee only for a specific Games. Part of a more flexible process for hosts, the intent of such additions is to showcase a host’s expertise as well as attract youth.

It’s up to Games organizers to propose new sports. The 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo, delayed a year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, introduced skateboarding, surfing, sport climbing and karate.

All but karate returned to the 2024 Summer Games in Paris and are on the program for the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles. Paris also saw breaking for the first time, but the hip-hop dance moves aren’t coming back for Los Angeles.

However, the California Games will feature several sports additions, including a pair of new Olympic sports, flag football and squash. Baseball, softball, lacrosse and cricket are all returning to the Olympics in 2028, in some cases after long absences.

Organizers of Utah’s 2034 Winter Games are years away from any decisions about adding new sports, but that hasn’t stopped enthusiasts from coming forward with suggestions about what they want to see.

Besides skimo, the growing list includes skijoring, a mashup of skiing and rodeo that originated in the West where a rider on horseback pulls a skier, and synchronized skating, which features teams of up to 20 ice skaters performing in unison.

Among the other contenders are a pair of sports that have nothing to do with the snow or ice typically associated with the Winter Games, cross-country running and cyclocross, a mix of road cycling, mountain biking and steeplechase.

How will Utah 2034 organizers pick new Winter Games sports?

“We’re popular, and we’ll be that way until we finalize this list. But that’s part of the process. Part of what’s great about the Olympics is it’s an evolving landscape,” said Brad Wilson, CEO of the Organizing Committee for the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.

“The organizing committee will actually go through a process starting probably in late 2027 or ‘28, where we will start to evaluate all our sport disciplines, in particular adding anything that’s new,” he said.

Just how they’ll be evaluated has yet to be determined, but Wilson said he can promise now that “fan engagement will be part of it, whether or not it fits into our existing venues and maximizes their efficiency will be part of it.”

Other criteria expected to be considered is whether the proposed addition is “an emerging sport that people use, is it balancing men’s and women’s sports,” he said. “Ask me in about 2½ years what that criteria looks like.”

There may be sports now “on the radar screen to at least evaluate. But we are way, way, long before we start doing it,” Wilson said. “We will finalize that probably around 2030, 2031, of what our sports disciplines will be for our Games. So a long time before we get there.”

It remains to be seen what the IOC’s process for adding sports will be for the 2034 Games. Under new IOC President Kirsty Coventry of Zimbabwe, a working group is reviewing all of the Olympic program.

“Nothing’s off the table. They have a pretty big scope,” Coventry, the IOC president, told reporters recently about the Olympic program working group when asked if rotating Games sites was on the agenda.

“I’ve asked them to look at everything,” Coventry told reporters after taking office in mid-2025. That includes “the complexity of the Games; sport, but also the disciplines in each sport; look at the potential rotation between summer and winter.”

A member of that working group, World Athletics President Sebastian Coe, has made no secret of his interest in seeing cross-country running added to the Winter Games as soon as the 2030 Olympics in the French Alps.

Coe, an IOC member from Britain, has said the track and field event would be “a good opportunity” for athletes from Africa at the Winter Games. “Winter Games aren’t African. It doesn’t scream African,” he told The Associated Press at last year’s New York City Marathon.

Also a possibility according to Coe? Moving some indoor sports, like judo, from the Summer to the Winter Games, he told the Guardian, saying Coventry is willing “to think differently about the program, and what could go out of the stadium, and that mix between winter and summer.”

U.S. skimo on the ‘Olympic map now’

Not everyone in the sports world is ready to see such sweeping changes.

In November, the Winter Olympic Federations that represent the traditional Olympic winter sports — biathlon, bobsled and skeleton, hockey, luge, skating, ski and snowboard, and curling — issued a statement opposing summer sports at the Winter Games.

“The Winter Olympic Federations are firm in our belief that such an approach would dilute the brand, heritage, and identity that make the Olympic Winter Games unique — a celebration of sports practiced on snow and ice, with distinct culture, athletes, and fields of play,” they said.

Winter Olympic Federations President Ivo Ferriani said skimo’s inclusion in this year’s Winter Games is “a successful example” of focusing on “evolving existing winter sports to attract broader participation and audiences.”

Skimo will be new to many Olympic viewers, especially in the United States, Utah’s Birkinshaw said, calling it “just so empowering” that their first exposure to the sport will be at a Winter Games where Team USA has a shot at medaling.

“Ski mountaineering has been a European-dominated sport for decades. It is so special, and honestly emotional, that the U.S. has built a name for ourselves in this sport,” she said. “We have shown the rest of the world we’re on this Olympic map now.”

PHOENIX — Sometimes it gets raw and it gets real, when a team meeting is more than an exercise in placating.

Such was the case for the Miami Heat ahead of Saturday night’s 147-116 victory over the Utah Jazz at the Delta Center.

This wasn’t just coach Erik Spoelstra admonishing in the aggregate. There were words for team captain Bam Adebayo and then blowback. This was, based on the comments that followed the private session, genuine angst about too much middling for a team yet again attempting to escape the play-in round.

“Spo kind of went off on us, especially on Bam, which I think kind of set the tone,” forward Nikola Jovic said, as the Heat turned their attention to Sunday night’s game against the Phoenix Suns at the close of their five-game western swing. “When you start talking to the captain first, we just knew we had to take more responsibility and be more locked in. So I think it’s simple as that. Just maybe we had a little more pressure on us and it helped.”

No umbrage taken, said Adebayo, who went for 26 points and 15 rebounds in the victory.

“I mean, it definitely’s clearing the air in the room,” Adebayo said of the candor of that Saturday morning session. “All that being said, we like when coach confronts us. It’s just he’s gotta be prepared when we bark back.

“We’re all grown men at the end of the day, so we don’t like what he said, we can always have a man-to-man conversation.”

Spoelstra said a focus in that session was defense and aggression, still with a bitter taste from Thursday night’s 127-110 loss to the Portland Trail Blazers in the middle game of the trip.

“We talked about in our meeting that we did not defend in the Portland game,” Spoelstra said. “It doesn’t matter what the stats were. It’s just there’s a feeling, and the Blazers did not feel us enough. And we paid the price for that.”

So against the Jazz that Heat attacked from every angle, but mostly on the glass, where they closed with a massive 64-34 edge, including a staggering 26 offensive rebounds, their highest total since January 1994. All of that with center Kel’el Ware sidelined for a fourth consecutive game with a hamstring strain and back in Miami receiving treatment.

Move aside Nikola Jokic, there’s a new triple-double king in the NBA — for this week.

In one of the most random statistical stretches in Utah Jazz history, Jusuf Nurkic has done what no other Utah Jazz player past or present has done: record three straight triple-doubles.

On Tuesday, Nurkic logged only the second triple-double in 16 years for Utah when he put up a 16-18-10 stat line in a win against the Timberwolves. It was the first time a Jazz player has recorded the feat since Jordan Clarkson in 2024.

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In the very next game, Nurkic recorded a 14-assist triple-double against the Spurs. This was the Jazz’s first back-to-back triple-double performance since the franchise’s all-time leader in triple doubles, Pete Maravich, did so in New Orleans.

Which brings us to Saturday. He can’t do it three times in a row. Right? Surely there’s now way.

Wrong. Nurkic has done it again.

Against the Heat on Saturday night, Nurkic put up 17 points, 10 rebounds and 12 assists to become the first player in franchise history to record three straight triple-doubles. He did the impossible.

He becomes only the fourth center in NBA history to get back-to-back-to-back triple-doubles.

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He is now one of one five players to have three triple-doubles to their name when wearing a Jazz uniform, joining Maravich (7), Mark Eaton (6), Karl Malone (3) and Andrei Kirilenko (3). He’s only played 36 games in a Jazz jersey, but is already etched in the history books.

With this accomplishment, Nurkic is now also the (unfortunate) owner of the worst plus-minus for a player with a triple-double in NBA history. His minus-30 in the 31-point loss to Miami surpassed Elfrid Payton and Lonzo Ball, who both recorded a minus-27 with the New Orleans Pelicans in 2019 and 2020 respectively.

This could very well be Nurkic’s only season in Utah, and I don’t foresee any great playoff battles for him wearing purple mountains on his jersey, but in 20 years every single Jazz fan will remember the triple-double drought, think of Nurkic’s three-game streak and say to themselves, “Oh yeah! Huh.”

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The Jazz are back in action on Tuesday night against the Clippers. Can Nurkic make it four in a row?

PROVO, Utah (ABC4 Sports) – AJ Dybantsa set a BYU freshman scoring record with 43 points, as #13 BYU completed a season sweep of rival Utah Saturday afternoon with a 91-78 victory at the Marriott Center.

Dybantsa went 15 for 24 from the floor and 9 for 10 from the free throw line for his first 40-point game. He surpassed Danny Ainge’s record for points in a game by a BYU freshman and added six rebounds, three assists and blocked a shot.

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BYU’s 13-game win streak ends with 84-71 loss at Texas Tech

The 43 points is the sixth most in BYU history, and the most since Tyler Haws scored 48 in 2014. Jimmer Fredette owns the other five highest point totals in BYU history.

When did he know he was going to have a special night?

“When I had like 26, Tyler [Mruss] actually said, ‘Yo, you better get 40,” Dybantsa said. “I looked at the scoreboard and there was like 11 minutes left and I was like, I might be able to get it. I don’t know too much about the rivalry. I’m from Boston, but people were just talking about Utah the whole time, so I was like, I guess, I guess I’ll go off for y’all.”

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“That was impressive,” BYU head coach Kevin Young said. This is a special, special player. I’ve said it a lot that he’s hands down the clear cut number one pick in the NBA draft.”

Rob Wright III finished with 21 points and Richie Saunders added 12 to help the Cougars (17-2, 5-1 Big 12) bounce back from an 84-71 loss to Texas Tech a week earlier. BYU shot 60% in the second half to pull away behind their freshman phenom.

“I’ve known him since I was like 16 years old,” Wright said. “So just to see him grow and just keep getting better and then go out there and get 40 points is just amazing.”

Keanu Dawes led Utah with 23 points and six rebounds. Terrence Brown chipped in 22 points and Don McHenry added 16 for the Utes (9-11, 1-6), who shot 62% from 3-point range.

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“That’s very encouraging,” Dawes said. “Obviously, it’s hard to 62% every game, but I think it just shows what we’re capable of.”

Dybantsa drove for a layup to cap a 14-3 run that gave BYU a 69-56 lead with 9:56 left. Saunders fueled the run with back-to-back layups and a pair of free throws over three straight possessions.

Dybantsa scored four baskets over five possessions — a dunk and three 3-pointers — to extend the Cougars’ lead to 87-68 with 3:12 left.

McHenry had four baskets to fuel a 16-7 spurt that put Utah up 28-26 with 6:56 left in the first half. The Utes made seven straight baskets to erase a seven-point deficit after starting 0 for 7 from the field.

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Dybantsa leads second half comeback in BYU’s 13th straight win

BYU scored on four of its final six possessions to take a 42-37 halftime lead. Dybantsa started and ended the run with baskets.

Even though this was the second time Utah played BYU tough, the Utes are done with moral victories.

“To be honest, it’s getting too late for four moral victories,” Brown said “We’ve got to win. The moral victories are getting old. We just got to start winning.”

“I think the first time this year I thought our guys quit at the end,” Utes head coach Alex Jensen said. “They felt defeated, which is kind of disheartening because I think we’ve always done a good job fighting and playing.”

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BYU next hosts No. 1 Arizona on Monday, while Utah next hosts Oklahoma State on January 31st.

Copyright 2026 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to ABC4 Utah.

The professional sports landscape in Utah will look slightly different this year.

Utah will still have the Utah Jazz, Mammoth, Real Salt Lake, Royals, Archers, LOVB Salt Lake and the Salt Lake Bees, but it will lose two established teams.

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In 2026, Utah will be without professional rugby after the Utah Warriors folded in November, and the state will also say goodbye to the Utah Grizzlies following their final game on April 11 before relocating to New Jersey.

Since the start of the new year, Utah has also welcomed two new teams to the state with the Salt Lake Apex, a men’s professional volleyball team, and the Utah Talons of the Athletes Unlimited Softball League.

The Apex began their inaugural season in January, while the Talons will begin play in June.

As Utah’s sports landscape shifts, what can Utahns expect from their teams in 2026?

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Leaders within the Larry H. Miller Company’s Miller Sports + Entertainment spoke with the Deseret News about what 2026 will look like for the Salt Lake Bees, Real Salt Lake and Utah Royals FC, even sharing a few teases for the year.

Sports at the center of memory-making

Larry H. Miller Company CEO Steve Starks described 2025 as a “banner year” for the company.

In 2025, the company purchased Real Salt Lake, Utah Royals FC and the Real Monarchs and also opened The Ballpark at America First Square, the new stadium for the Bees, in Daybreak.

“We were very fortunate to acquire Real Salt Lake and the Utah Royals, and we’re so excited about the future of soccer in America, in Utah, and those clubs,” Starks said.

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Last year, over 6.2 million guests passed through the company’s venues — Megaplexes, America First Field and The Ballpark at America First Square — according to Michelle Smith, the company’s chief people officer and the president of Miller Sports + Entertainment.

“It’s 6.2 million people, but it’s one memory at a time,” Starks said. “And we want to continue to bring people together and create those experiences that they’ll remember for a lifetime.”

Starks considers the company and its leaders “stewards” of sports and entertainment experiences.

In fact, when John Kimball, the president of business operations at Real Salt Lake and Utah Royals FC, meets someone, he challenges them to think of their top 10 memories.

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“If they think of their top 10 memories, I always argue that two to three of them have something to do with sports. It’s either that you went with your mom or your dad to something, or you took your child to something, or you saw something extraordinary happen just in the realm of sports,” he said.

The Miller company hopes to facilitate more of those memories, whether it’s by catching a foul ball at a Bees game or watching Messi play against RSL live in Utah.

“Those memories are really the goals that we focus on as a sports organization, as a sports team, to try to create so that people want to come back,” Kimball said.

Another new chapter for the Salt Lake Bees

Now that the Bees have settled into their new hive, general manager Ty Wardle said the team is “looking for opportunities to really engage the fan and increase the fan experience out of the new ballpark again.”

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The 2026 season begins in March.

The team will release its promotional calendar for the season on Feb. 3. The Bees will also debut new partnerships and a new alternate identity, which will be announced in late February.

“Typically, the teams create an alt identity that is significant to their local community or state. There’s a unique tie, a creative, really fun tie, and, as is the unique side of minor league baseball, you get to have some fun with it,” Smith said.

Palm Beach Frozen Iguanas, Pawtucket Hot Wieners, New Hampshire Space Potatoes, Eugene Exploding Whales, Hartford Bouncing Pickles and the Hickory Dickory Docks are just a few examples of the alternate identities teams have come up with over the years.

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Smith believes the Bees’ alternate identity will make fans “smile ear to ear.”

The 2026 season will also mark another new chapter for the Bees with the departure of longtime manager Keith Johnson, who became the Los Angeles Angels’ third base coach in November.

The Bees have yet to publicly announce the team’s new manager, but “he’ll be introduced here shortly as well,” Wardle said.

Development will also continue around the ballpark with the addition of new dining options. In 2026, Red Iguana, Nomad Eatery and Rockwell Ice Cream will open new locations near the ballpark.

Playoffs the goal for Utah Royals FC

Jason Kreis, president of soccer operations of Real Salt Lake and Utah Royals FC, has high hopes and expectations for the Royals in 2026.

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The Utah Royals have won just 13 of 52 regular-season games and lost 28 since returning to the NWSL in 2024. The team has never made the playoffs, including in its first iteration from 2018 to 2020.

“They have a very clear objective for this year, that is to make the playoffs. I think the team has shown over the second half of 2025 that they are capable of that. But even having said that, I think it will be an improved team,” Kreis said.

This offseason, the Royals have signed midfielder Madison Hammond, defender Miyabi Moriya and Utah native and former Ute Courtney Brown.

Kreis said the team “will probably add about three more players, all of starting caliber.” The team has since traded for Brown’s former Washington Spirit teammate, midfielder Narumi Miura.

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“So we would expect that the level of the team will be high. We will expect that the level of the coaching will maintain what it did in the second half of the season under their new direction,” he said.

Off the pitch in 2026, the Miller company is “fully invested to continuing to grow the fandom of the Royals,” Smith said.

Part of that will come through the team’s new jersey. Last year’s jersey was a tribute to the Great Salt Lake.

“What I love about it is it’s not only a cool jersey that you’re going to want to wear, it’s going to come with some intention of creating connection with the fans and building a fandom,” Smith said.

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Smith did share a tease for the new design.

“We want to create the swarm, right?” she said. “You’ll get it when you see it. But these working bees that are all swarmed together to support and grow and build.”

New heights for Real Salt Lake, Diego Luna

With Real Salt Lake having made the playoffs in 18 of the last 21 years, Kreis has higher expectations for the club.

“The success level has been good to get us to a place where we’re competing for a championship by making the playoffs. But we will push forward and make a clear objective that the team does better than just make the playoffs this year. We really think we ought to be making the next rounds,” he said.

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A major key to accomplishing that objective is Diego Luna, who emerged as a rising star on the international stage with the U.S. men’s national team last year.

“It didn’t happen overnight, but this development happened very, very fast,” Kreis said.

In three years, Luna went from playing in the USL Championship, the United States’ second tier of professional men’s soccer, in El Paso, Texas, to making a name for himself in the MLS with RSL and on the national team.

Despite his impressive leaps, there’s still new heights for Luna to reach, with Kreis noting that the 22-year-old “is not a finished product.”

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“He is still somebody that we think needs development, needs good players around him so that he can truly shine,” Kreis said. “But yes, we are absolutely ecstatic that he is an RSL player and will continue to be an RSL player through this season and through what should be an amazing World Cup for him.”

Outside of providing an additional stage for Luna to shine on, the World Cup will be a tipping point for the state of soccer in the U.S. and Utah, Kimball said.

“I really believe that our future players, the little 8-year-old kids that are watching soccer and watching World Cup now, will become our professional athletes in the next five to 10 years that will allow us to compete on that global stage because of this tipping point that’s happening now.”

Enhancing the fan experience and welcoming the GOAT

In 2026, Real Salt Lake will welcome Lionel Messi and Inter Miami to Utah for the first time. The team has already experienced an unprecedented demand for tickets to the match, as the Deseret News previously reported.

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While the team can’t guarantee Messi will play, it feels “bullish” about the chances, according to Kimball.

“We know that Messi wants to play as much as he can before the World Cup, and then we’d also heard from the league that he’s really trying to earmark and focus on games that allow him to play at altitude and allow him to get into the best shape that he can,” Kimball said.

To accommodate the ticket demand for the Inter Miami match, 2,000 seats will be added to the north concourse of America First Field.

The two-level seating will be left up for the entirety of the season and will be similar to the scaffolding seating used at Black Desert’s PGA events, according to Kimball.

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“I actually think it’s going to be awesome because it’ll be out of the sun. Potentially, we’ll have some heating in it. It’ll be protected from rain, and so I think with some of our early season games, it’ll be a nice addition to what we’re doing to the building,” he said.

In addition to the extra seating, America First Field will undergo some renovations, beginning with enhancements of the stadium’s west side premium areas and moving the employee offices out of the stadium.

“There’ll be other phases that are going to be happening over the next couple of years with some really exciting things happening with the Miller block and with the Real Salt Lake America First Field,” Kimball said.

The fan experience is a priority for the Miller company, according to Smith, who acknowledged the entertainment production that live professional sporting events have become.

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She noted how the additional seating will make the stadium louder and increase the energy felt during RSL games.

The company is looking to do the same with the Royals, including possibly shifting the seating “to create that same energy,” Smith said.

“We’re really challenging our marketing and game experience team to continue to stretch in how we’re connecting with the fans and creating traditions and just enjoying the experience even more.”