Site MapFrom Basketball Star to Pickleball Legend
Michigan athlete proves to be multi-skilled and team oriented.
Welcome back to UMich Pickleball Player introductions, a series where I reveal a different University of Michigan Pickleball player every week. This week, the spotlight is on Brent Usui!
Usui is a student pursuing his Master’s in biomedical engineering at Michigan. He spent his early years in California and attended the Olin College of Engineering as an undergrad, eventually graduating with a degree in Mechanical Engineering. While an interest in engineering and innovation may have always been rooted in Usuis’ identity, playing pickleball is a fixation that only recently developed.
Usui stepped on the court for the first time in the summer of 2022, simply to hang out and bond with his dad. Other than that, he didn’t take the sport much more seriously until another year later. In summer 2023, Usui kept playing, kept having fun, and realized just how quickly he’d come to pick up many of the game’s fundamentals. He’d begun to drill with his dad and a family friend, routinely beating them in 2v1 style practice-matches. With this heartfelt experience behind him, Usui tried out and earned a spot on the Michigan team back in the fall!
Currently, Usui’s path to playing pickleball is one of the more unique on the University of Michigan team. The vast majority of the team has extensive tennis experience, many as valuable players on high school teams and some even having college level experience. Thanks to this experience, these players have been fostering the hand-eye and racket-to-ball coordination required for competitive pickleball prior to ever trying out for the UMich team.
Usui’s athletics background is a bit different. He played basketball his entire childhood as a primary sport and had solid skills there; during a high school game he even hit a buzzer-beater. Yet, not many skills in basketball translate to pickleball. There’s no dribbling or shooting in pickleball and no slap/racket-type-contact or reaction-work in basketball. Although, the footwork that is emphasized and practiced heavily in basketball surely has some merit within the game of pickleball. Nevertheless, this isn’t to say Usui’s background is absent from hand-eye coordination training–he played golf all four years of high school. Ignoring the contexts in which the balls are being shot at, hitting a little white ball with a wedge is surely harder than getting the sweet spot of the paddle on the pickleball.
Usui’s biggest strength isn’t any specific shot or move, but rather a player trait: he’s a fast learner. Relative to the start of the season, no player has made as big of an improvement as Usui. From his drives to his dinks to his drops, everything has improved drastically–if you asked him, though, he’d say there is still much work to be done. He aims to someday reach 5.0 DUPR territory, but admits that would take considerable time, effort, and practice.
Usui is pursuing a high-advanced to low-expert level of play (though I’m sure he’d be down to reach even higher heights)
As a teammate of Usui’s, I can attest to the fact that his outlook on the sport makes playing with him super fun. His determination to try as hard as possible to improve and win points in conjunction with the ability to shrug off losses is admirable because, well, it is just a game. Usui’s positive attitude combined with his persistence to improve and humble acknowledgement of the work ahead instills a confidence that he’ll someday reach his 5.0-play aspirations. Usui’s mindset and grit makes me feel lucky to be on a team with him.
