Fargo Force unveil 2026-27 schedule with early home-and-road tests

Waterloo comes to Scheels Arena for Fargo’s first two games of the 2026-27 USHL regular season, a Sept. 25-26 home set that immediately gives the Force a measuring stick. The schedule the club unveiled on June 23 stacks the opening six weeks with repeat opponents, short turnarounds and several road tests that will show quickly whether Brett Skinner’s group can handle the league’s early grind.

After the home opening against the Waterloo Black Hawks, Fargo heads straight into a demanding trip to Youngstown for games on Oct. 2 and 3, then goes to Sioux Falls on Oct. 9. The first month also brings a back-to-back at home against the Green Bay Gamblers on Oct. 15 and 16, then another home doubleheader against the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders on Oct. 22 and 23. Fargo closes October on the road at Sioux Falls and Sioux City, a stretch that mixes divisional rivals with travel-heavy weekends and should start sorting out the Force’s place in the Western Conference.

The league-wide picture adds another layer. The USHL said the 2026-27 season will be its 25th as USA Hockey’s only Tier-I junior league, with all 16 teams playing a 62-game cross-conference schedule. The season begins at the 11th annual USHL Fall Classic in Chicago from Sept. 16-20, and the regular season is scheduled to end on Saturday, April 3, 2027. Fargo’s first regular-season game after the Fall Classic is the Sept. 25 home date with Waterloo, which makes the opener the first true checkpoint after the league’s showcase weekend.

That matters for a franchise that has already proven it can win big and draw big. Fargo won the 2024 Clark Cup, finished as the Western Conference regular-season champion in 2023-24 and captured the Anderson Cup as the USHL’s best regular-season team in that same run. The Force also set a franchise attendance record in 2024-25 with an average of 4,273 at Scheels Arena, drew 123,906 fans and posted a franchise-best 10 sellouts, achievements that helped lead to Katie Merrick being named the USHL’s 2024-25 Executive of the Year.

Cary Eades remains the team’s president of hockey operations and assistant general manager, and Scheels Arena has been Fargo’s home since the franchise launched in 2008. The competitive schedule came out separately from the promotional calendar, leaving another announcement still to come, but the hockey slate already points to a first half loaded with rematches, road tests and enough back-to-backs to shape the Force before winter settles in.