Rhode Island FC kicks off four-game homestand Saturday night

Rhode Island FC will be back at Centreville Bank Stadium Saturday night to kick off four straight home matches.

RIFC will host North Carolina FC, as it looks to win its first match at home and turn things around after a tough stretch.

"It will be really good for us to start to build some momentum at home," said midfielder Joe Brito. "The start of the season we were on the road, pretty much the whole time. It will be good to get some continuity at home."

The club has lost three of its last four games, including two straight.

RIFC sits in the bottom half of the league standings, but the team isn't panicking, especially after it turned things around following a slow start last season.

"It hurts to lose," said head coach Khano Smith. "It hurts to lose the last two home games, it hurts. It feels bad, but in reality it's not that bad because we're better off than we were last year at this time. Because we've lost more, emotionally it feels like that. They feel it, I feel it, we all feel it. I'm sure the fans feel it, everybody feels it. But we also have to keep things in perspective that we're in a better position than we were last year."

RIFC's losses have come in close margins.

Their last three were one-goal decisions.

The focus heading into the homestand is generating more goals, as the club is third in the Eastern Conference in shots, but has only found the back of the net 11 times.

"I think we're having more possession, I think we're a better passing team but we're not as dangerous as we were last year, said Smith. "So it's trying to find the balance of being better passing and creating more, and being more dangerous so we can score more."

"I think we all just need to take a deep breath, relax a little bit." said Brito. "I think we get a little excited in front of goal so it's just kind of forgetting the narratives and worrying about what's happening in front of us. We all have been playing with each other for awhile, we know what to do when we get in front of goal so we just need to calm down, take a deep breath and get that monkey off our back."

Match time is Saturday night at 7 p.m.