In recent years, pickleball has seen a massive surge in popularity, and now, the paddle sport has made its way to Carnegie Mellon. For founder and co-president Dominick Robinson, a senior studying math, Carnegie Mellon’s pickleball club started as a way to compete in buggy.
“It was kind of like a spur-of-the-moment thing,” Robinson said. “I was thinking like, ‘You know what would be really cool, if I could have a buggy team, how do I get a buggy team, well I guess I need an organization for that. What can I make an organization of? Oh well, pickleball is becoming popular, I like pickleball.’” He and the other founders ended up getting a lot of students to sign up during the fall of 2023. The club grew, the members played in tournaments, and the buggy idea was soon a thing of the past.
The team initially made a name for itself in local tournaments. They played in competitions, such as Dinklesburgh or Battle at the Bridge. Through these tournaments, the members of the club stacked up medals. As the club grew, they started competing against other college pickleball teams. They’ve played local colleges, such as Robert Morris, Ohio State University, the University of Pittsburgh, and Case Western University. They’ve also competed in national tournaments.
Pickleball is one of America’s fastest-growing sports. The club leaders had a few ideas about what makes it so popular. “Pickleball is successful because it’s easy, it’s fun … you don’t need to be extremely athletic to play it,” co-president Tristan Ohler, a master’s student in international relations and politics, said. “You can just come out here, like we have people that like, come from Ohio and who don’t do anything else athletic on campus, and they’re good, and they love to play, and they get a good workout in.”
The simplicity of the sport makes it accessible for all ages, making it popular in summer camps and retirement communities alike. Finance officer Gabriel Prado, a master’s student in mechanical engineering, said, “There is very little age gap, you can play against everybody. You’d be surprised at the number of people who are a lot older than can beat you.” “And also people that are younger,” Ohler added. “You can play 5-year-olds that are gonna be good. It’s so easy to pick up.” Robinson also feels that pickleball is an engaging sport to play. “[Pickleball] has really fun points, a lot of cat and mouse, fun strategy,” he said.
During The Tartan’s interview with Robinson, a student came up to him asking where to go for the pickleball club. She said she didn’t have any equipment. Ohler told her she was in the right place, saying, “We have paddles, we have everything you need, we have people who will teach you.” That welcoming spirit continues to be a core value for the club. Many students stop by occasionally to play a few rounds, connect with other players, and get moving. Ohler shares that “It’s a huge community thing because you’re so close when you’re playing, you’re at maximum 40 feet apart, so you’re talking the whole match. Whether it’s tripping somebody, whether it’s laughing.”
Despite the camaraderie among the members, the club has a competitive side. Their website contains a tracker of medals won by each player to acknowledge each player’s hard work. The leaders of the club playfully compete against each other to see who will have the most medals. This competitive spirit shows through the club’s outcomes at tournaments. Last semester, the team qualified for nationals, where 64 other schools were competing. They brought eight people and “did quite well,” Ohler said. “We played a top ten school and went 1 in 3 against them.”
Will the Carnegie Mellon pickleball club be competing in the buggy this spring? Unfortunately, no. “We wanted to make a very ambitious buggy, but that didn’t fit into our schedules. We wanted to make the Big Dill, the biggest buggy of all time,” Robinson shared. From their recent stats, it seems they have their hands full, anyway.
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