The Aceholes intramural pickleball team of industrial engineering junior Kyle Nguyenphu and civil engineering sophomore Elvin Jaya defeated teams Socks and Hajjplayspickle, 21-9 and 21-6 respectively, on Wednesday at the Omar Instructional Tennis Center.
During the first match of the night, the Aceholes quickly put up a 7-2 lead before the Socks notched two of their own points on the board. Following a quick turnover, the engineering duo went on a 4-0 run to increase their lead to 11-4. In intramural pickleball rules, teams switch sides of the court when one team reaches 11. The first team to 21 points wins within a 30-minute time limit.
Part of their win stemmed from the fact that opponents with tennis backgrounds play differently and that knowledge can be used as a benefit, Nguyenphu said.
“They were pretty good and they definitely had a tennis background,” Nguyenphu said. “We knew they had a tennis background because I kind of know one of them, so I know he’s just going to fire and we know their weaknesses. A lot of tennis players don’t like to hit it soft. They just want to keep slamming it every time.”
After the switch, the Aceholes added four more points to their lead before the Socks sided out. The Socks quickly regained the serve after two great returns, trailing 15-6. The Aceholes allowed three more points against them before serving for the final time. A deep lob from Jaya ended the match with a final score of 21-9.
Jaya said the Aceholes’ ability to go on scoring runs made it much easier for the duo to come out with a win.
“Once you get a good rhythm going and you have momentum behind you, it’s pretty easy to get two or three points just like that,” Jaya said. “If the other team is feeling it, their energy is up and the other team that’s against the run, they’re a little bit lower.”
The final match of the night saw the Aceholes go up against Hajjplayspickle for a shot at an undefeated regular season record. Jaya quickly put his team on the board with two back-to-back midcourt hits for a 2-0 lead. After a hitting error from the Aceholes, Hajjplayspickle gained the serve with a 3-1 score before losing it after a ball into the net.
The Aceholes continued to capitalize on miscommunication and mistakes from their opponents as they went on a 5-0 run, highlighted by a stunning hit from Jaya in between the players.
Following a short possession by Hajjplayspickle, the Aceholes went on another run that increased their lead to 11-2 before switching sides. A few faults and mistakes from both teams later, the Aceholes retained their lead of 20-6 until giving the serve back to Hajjplayspickle. After five turnovers between the two teams, the Aceholes managed to skim a ball over the net to win 21-6.
“We just played really consistently, [and] our shots were very purposeful,” Jaya said. “We put the ball where we wanted to and got points off of that.”
Looking ahead to playoffs, Jaya said these two matches were eye-openers for the duo.
“These [matches] definitely give us stuff we need to work on,” Jaya said. “Closing out that second match took a little bit more effort than we’d like, and that’s something we need to work on. It was a good wake-up call going into playoffs.”
Neomi Brown is a university studies senior and contributed this article from the course JOUR 359, Reporting Sports, to The Battalion.
