Welcome back to The Pickleball Clinic Newsletter!

Will pickleball become an official NCAA college sport? Today, we'll discuss if and when that might happen, find out what went down at the U.S. Open in Florida, discover the latest young phenom, and much more.

Let’s go! 👇

Last week, we spoke with a parent of a high school varsity pickleball player in Montgomery County, Maryland, the only place where pickleball is played as an official high school varsity sport. But what about the next level up, college pickleball?

We know that pickleball is already an organized club sport in well over 100 colleges across the country. But will it become an official NCAA Division 1 college sport? And if so, when?

It's an interesting question, so we decided to ask all of you via our Facebook and Instagram communities. The vast majority of you answered "yes," and we agree.

However, a few that answered "no" pointed to the fact that many colleges are cutting sports programs, not adding them. Also, adding a sport generally means that it will have to be supported by the few Division 1 sports that generate money for colleges, like football and basketball.

From a Title IX perspective, (Title IX is a 1972 civil rights law requiring that women and men be provided equitable opportunities to participate in sports), pickleball is great because it provides the same opportunities and experience for both women and men.

Moreover, because of mixed doubles, pickleball would also be a coed sport, which is quite rare, as fencing, skiing, and rifle are currently the only three coed NCAA sports.

Regardless of if or when pickleball becomes an official NCAA sport, there is currently so much organized intercollegiate competition, that it almost doesn’t matter.

For example, there are three existing college pickleball leagues: the Collegiate Series (with big APP and Selkirk affiliations), the National Collegiate Pickleball Association (with various sponsors), and the College Pickleball Tour (with big DUPR and JOOLA affiliations), which just had its national championship tournament last week in Atlanta, Georgia.

The tournament was not some rinky-dink social meetup, but rather a highly competitive March Madness style event with more than 700 students from 64 colleges.

The top two DUPR rated teams met in the finals, with Florida Atlantic University defeating Utah Tech. Just to give you an idea of the skill levels, the average DUPR rating for those two teams were roughly 5.3 for the women and 5.6 for the men.

Other teams that made it to the quarterfinals included UNC, Utah Valley University, Indiana, Wisconsin, Florida, and BYU. Congratulations to all the teams that qualified for the tournament, and keep on pickling!

Keep Your Eye on the Ball

It sounds simple, but many players unknowingly look away just before contact. Instead of tracking the ball all the way through the hit, they lift their head early. This usually leads to one of two mistakes: either the ball sails long because the head lift raises the swing, or it drops into the net because the paddle comes up too quickly. Staying locked in on the ball through contact can eliminate both.

You know when you make all the hard shots and then miss the easy one? Don’t worry, that happens to pros too. 👇

We humans have a pretty cool trait: we strive for excellence. If we're taking a test, we want to get the highest score we can. If we're drawing a picture, we want it to look as good as possible. That doesn't mean we are all Einstein or Michelangelo—and we know that. But we are taking the gifts life has given us and maximizing them to their fullest potential.

So sure, the vast majority of us will not be the next Ben Johns or Anna Bright. But we can win a tournament at the 3.0 level, or 4.0, or 5.0+. That's why we want to use the same tools Ben and Anna use to reach our peak. Those tools are JOOLA paddles because they are the best paddles on the planet. Period. Check out the ones everyone is talking about, the new JOOLA Pro Vs, which uses kick-point engineering inspired by golf clubs and hockey sticks. Grab yours right here.

Welcome back to the section where we define a word or term that is widely used in the pickleball world…

Continental Grip (noun phrase)

There are many ways to hold the handle of a paddle in your hand. The most neutral and versatile one is called the "continental grip" because it can be used to hit every shot. To hold your paddle with a continental grip, grasp the handle such that your index finger and thumb form a "V" in line with the edge of the paddle. Another way to get there is to grip the handle as if you were holding a hammer and using the edge of the paddle to hammer a nail into a wall.

We talked about college pickleball tournaments above, but now it's time to look at one of the biggest pro (and amateur) tournaments in the world, the U.S. Open. 

Held each year in Naples, Florida, at East Naples Community Park, this was the first year with the location's new name, the "USOP National Pickleball Center." Regardless of the name, it is still the biggest pickleball facility in the world, with 65 courts. 

Despite its enormous size, the tournament has to turn thousands of applicants away each year to cap the participants at a little under 3,500 because it simply doesn't have room for more players.

Before we get into the results of the pro events, we do have to mention that with very few exceptions, United Pickleball Association (UPA) players are not allowed to participate in this tournament.

Since the UPA is the parent company of the PPA Tour and Major League Pickleball, it means that the majority of the very best players in the world cannot compete in the U.S. Open.

Remember we said there were some exceptions? Well, the most notable one was the biggest name in the sport right now, 19-year-old sensation and undisputed female GOAT, Anna Leigh Waters.

Since her usual playing partners were not allowed to play, she partnered with her mom (as she did the last two years) in women's doubles and with Jay Devilliers (one of the other UPA player exceptions) in mixed doubles.

In women's doubles, the Waters were pushed a bit in the semifinals, but ultimately won the final pretty easily for their third consecutive title.

In mixed doubles, Waters and Devilliers played Casey Diamond and Sofia Sewing. The teams split the first two games, and in the third, Waters and Devilliers had an astounding 16 match points before ultimately winning 11-9 in the third.

Other winners of the major pro categories were Jack Munro and Richard Livornese in men's doubles, Kat Stewart in women's singles (Waters did not play in that event), and Dusty Boyer in men's singles.

That might be grounds for divorce. 😂

You know when you discover something that is so helpful or useful, you wish you had found it years before? We mean things like earmuffs, bidets, and those awesome pickleball tubes that make bending down to pick up balls a thing of the past. Well, the hydration and electrolytes that Holey Performance provides are a lot like that.

For those who haven't used supplements, you simply don't know what you're missing. But when you sweat (and you will even more when you play outside this season), you lose valuable minerals. Holey Performance replaces those minerals and is specifically designed for pickleball players to stop cramps, prevent brain fog, and stay fresh on the court. Grab one today and get another one FREE with code (BOGOCLINIC).

Being able to reset the ball is a very important skill to have in pickleball—especially at higher levels when you need to stay alive in points for as long as possible. Today, pro pickleball player, Allyce Jones, explains what to do in order to hit consistent resets. 👇

14-year-old, Kelly Goodnow, has joined the Professional Pickleball Association (PPA) Tour. Goodnow was the #1 ranked player in the Junior PPA 14 & Under division before making the leap to the pros. Goodnow has only been playing pickleball for about a year and half, although she has been playing tennis since she was just four years old. “I hated pickleball at first,” said Goodnow. “I was annoyed that they were taking over the tennis courts, but then when I first played, I thought, 'Oh shoot, this is actually fun.'”

Hope you enjoyed the read. See you next week!

- Your Friends at The Pickleball Clinic

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