‘It made sense’: High school pickleball tourney taps into sport’s popularity
Those cicadas tried. They really did.
But the insects’ collective chorusing had to settle for runner-up honors to the clop-clop-clop of pickleball rallies in auditions for the unofficial “Soundtrack of June” competition.
“The popularity of pickleball is insane,” said Naperville North High School senior-to-be Kyle Tran, who served as a co-president of his school’s pickleball club in 2023-24. “It’s going on everywhere, outdoors and indoors, and being played by kids and adults of all ages. I picked up a pickleball racket for the first time shortly after the pandemic. I played in a tournament for a charity.
“It’s a fun and relatively easy sport, though it took me about a month to figure out the scoring,” added Tran, a setter/libero for the Huskies’ varsity volleyball team in the spring. “But people find out there’s more to pickleball than hitting shots. I continue to learn how important it is to know the sport’s strategies, and there are a lot of them.”
Tran couldn’t wait to execute his variety of tactics — alongside doubles partner and recent Naperville North graduate Nathan Lee — ahead of the inaugural Illinois High School Pickleball State Championships, which take place Thursday and Friday at Sure Shot Pickleball in Naperville, an 11-court indoor facility that opened in mid-September. Naperville North’s club players honed their games Wednesdays at Sure Shot during the school year.
The two-day tourney at Sure Shot, located at 2244 Corporate Lane in Naperville, also includes girls doubles and mixed doubles draws, with no minimum-age restriction. Incoming freshmen, as well as recent high school graduates, were allowed to join returning prep students while representing their schools and vying for trophies in a sport that might be considered for IHSA-sanctioned status if enough schools become involved.
“It made sense to host such a state tournament because there are more and more pickleball clubs at high schools,” Sure Shot co-owner Tim Kelly said, adding youth hailing from Naperville, Wheaton, Downers Grove, Aurora and the Stevenson school district had registered to compete two weeks before the start of the tournament.
“This type of event wasn’t entirely my idea. I called a pickleball club owner in Utah, where indoor pickleball is huge, and he told me his club had hosted a successful high school pickleball tournament. We’re excited to run a first-of-its-kind event in Illinois.”
Sure Shot Pickleball Director of Marketing and Strategic Partnerships Evan Nimke grew up in Mequon, Wis., and is fairly new to pickleball. He introduced the sport to his sons, 9-year-old Grayson and 8-year-old Brayden, atop the family driveway one day.
“I was shocked how quickly they picked it up,” Nimke recalled. “They love it. When they first played tennis, all they wanted to do was hit ‘homers’ over the fence. It’s hard to hit a ball very far in pickleball. I’m not very good at pickleball, but I think it’s a great sport because there’s a social aspect to it as well as a competitive component. The popularity of it continues to amaze me. You should see the number of people who line up outside Sure Shot on the days we open at 6 a.m.”
According to pickleheads.com, pickleball is the fastest-growing sport in America for the third year running. Pickleball participation has grown an average of 223% over the last three years, per the Sports and Fitness Industry Association, and it’s trending younger. The top professional female in the world is Anna Leigh Waters, who turned 17 on Jan. 26.
And now, for the first time in Illinois, teens get to serve ’em up at a pickleball tourney and clop repeatedly while wearing their school colors, thanks to the forward-thinking organizers at Sure Shot.
“I plan to wear a Naperville North-themed shirt and pair of shorts,” Tran said while he worked on his game on a pickleball court at Grant Park in Chicago. “I’ll be fully decked out in Naperville North attire.
“I might even show up in a Huskies sweatshirt, though I’ll probably take that off after warming up.”