Reigning DUPR Champs UVA Face Competition in Atlantic Region

As pickleball explodes in popularity across the country, America's favorite sport is gaining a foothold on college campuses across the country. As the fourth installment of a five-part series, theTUNDRA explores the state of collegiate pickleball in each region of the U.S. Today’s entry focuses on the sport at colleges across the Atlantic region. Read our entries on the West and Midwest, along with our overview of the sport on a national scale.

The Background: Colliegate Pickleball

Unlike NCAA sports, college pickleball is mostly made up of student-run teams. These clubs not only hold meetings, events, and exhibition matches within the squad, but the clubs, often abiding by constitutions authored by student-club members, also field competitive teams that travel to eight super regionals, and its annual national championships, tournaments where they compete against other schools. Ratings system DUPR, with 16 regional events, eight super regionals, and its annual national championships, is the most important tournament circuit -- and pretty much the North Star every collegiate pickleball player is shooting to impress. Talk to any collegiate pickleball club player about DUPR and they'll fill the air with more happy, competitive talk about increasing their DUPR ratings than Friday night happy hour on Main Street U.S.A.

Other nationally recognized professional tournaments, such as the APP Tour and the upstart National Collegiate Pickleball Association are involved as well, each hosting their own collegiate championship tournaments. In a sport with so much room to grow, only time will tell which organization will win out.

The Teams: Atlantic Region

The University of Virginia might be better know as a basketball school, but recently its pickleball team has been playing well enough to make Thomas Jefferson proud. The Cavaliers entered the DUPR National Championships as the No. 5 seed, but made a shock run to the title. In the process, they knocked off No. 1 seed Utah Tech University by a score of three games to one, and reigning champs North Carolina in a dramatic final. Their title run wasn’t enough to vault the Cavaliers into the top spot on the DUPR rankings, though – they rank second to only UNC.

The club started in late 2020, and has since grown to its current size of 600 members. Team president Connor Burns estimates that it's the biggest pickleball club in the U.S, and according to team member Alexandra McDonald, that number will get much bigger in the months following their national title.

“We’ve had so many people reach out,” McDonald said in an interview with UVA Today. “And the interest has exploded. After everyone saw us win the national championship, we’ve gotten thousands of [messages] on Instagram from people wanting to join the team. They’re asking, ‘When are tryouts?’”

UVA wasn’t the only school in the East to make a surprise run at nationals. Entering the tournament at No. 7, Florida Atlantic University swept all five opponents they faced in group play. The Owls then knocked off No. 4 seed Utah Valley by a score of 3-1 to reach the semifinal, echoing FAU’s run to the men’s basketball Final Four last season (albeit on an ever-so-slightly smaller stage). The Owls’ luck ran out though, and they exited in the semifinal with a loss to UNC. The Boca Raton, FL club, which also won DUPR’s Florida Regional in September, was rewarded for its tournament run, moving up to No. 4 in the rankings.

Yet another Cinderella Story in November came from the East. The University of Florida came in ranked No. 16, before stunning No. 4 Utah Valley and No. 9 Indiana. The Gators’ success shouldn’t come as a surprise though – they put on a strong showing at DUPR’s Individual National Championships, taking home two of the tournament’s five silver medals. With such a talented team, it's a mystery why DUPR counted out the Gainesville, FL squad. The post-tournament rankings did make amends though, moving the Gators up to No. 10.

Earlier this month, the Gators built on their momentum at the APP’s Collegiate Championships, reaching the final before losing to Utah Tech, while showing that November’s run wasn’t a fluke.

Two hours northwest of Gainesville, Florida State University ranks No. 12. The Tallahassee, FL club reached the play-in round at nationals, but lost to Utah Valley.

One spot below Florida State, the No. 13 University of Maryland also made a surprise run at nationals (sensing a theme here?). The Terrapins entered the weekend ranked No. 18, but knocked off No. 6 Utah State and No. 8 NC State en route to the quarterfinals. The College Park, MD club is also noteworthy because of their partnership with MLP’s D.C. Pickleball Team. The MLP club supplies the Terrapins with professional-level equipment, including JOOLA paddles, in an effort to grow the sport in the D.C. area. Maybe that’s why Maryland was able to make a run at nationals.

While those are the heavy hitters in the South, a trio of schools not exactly known for athletics are among the better pickleball teams in the country. A pair of Jacksonville-area schools, the University of North Florida and Southeastern University, cracked the top-30 of DUPR’s rankings, coming in at No. 23 and No. 28 respectively. Meanwhile, Harrisonburg, VA’s James Madison University is the second highest ranked team in Virginia at No. 29, behind only the national champs.

The Tournaments 

There were relatively few major collegiate pickleball tournaments in the Eastern U.S last year. The primary one is DUPR’s Florida Regional in Boca Raton, FL., which took place in late September, with FAU taking the crown. Aside from that, DUPR didn’t host any major tournaments in the region, although nearby Eastern teams can play in DUPR regionals in North Carolina, Georgia and Ohio.

In 2024, DUPR’s format is changing to include 16 regionals, along with eight super regionals. While the locations of the regional tournaments haven’t been announced yet, seven of the eight super regionals have. One of them, the Virginia Super Regional, will be held in the Atlantic region. The tournament is slated for late March in Richmond, VA.

The NCPA also runs only one tournament in the East, and it’s also in Florida. The upstart organization is slated to hold its Florida Alumni Fundraiser later this year in Holly Hill, FL, with a prize pool of $5,000.

Why did the Atlantic Outperform Expectations at Nationals?

East Coast bias is a common accusation in college sports. The idea, essentially, is that teams in the Pacific and Mountain time zones play after viewers on the East Coast are asleep, leaving them severely underrated among pundits and fans.

But in pickleball, the opposite seems to be true. Nearly every team from the East Coast at nationals exceeded expectations in the tournament, suggesting that the entire region had somehow been overlooked.

There are a few possible reasons for this. One is that pickleball infrastructure skews West. USA Pickleball is headquartered in Arizona, the PPA Tour has been based in both Salt Lake City, UT and Dallas, TX, and MLP is based in Austin, TX. It’s possible that there are more opportunities to gain exposure closer to where pickleball’s main players operate.

Another possibility – that’s not unrelated – is the lack of tournaments in the East. Of DUPR’s 12 regional tournaments n 2023, just one – the Florida Regional – was held in the region. The same goes for the NCPA circuit, where just the Florida Alumni Fundraiser took place in the region. There wasn’t a since major Eastern tournament outside of Florida, meaning that if you consider Florida to be part of the South, no major collegiate tournaments were played in the East.

All of these factors mean there were fewer opportunities for collegiate pickleballers on the East Coast to gain exposure and show their skills on a big stage.

The Stars

The headliner in the region is Florida’s Jack Foster. The pro-player ranks No. 32 in the world for men’s singles, per DUPR, and ranks No. 6 on the APP Tour in the same category. Foster took first place at the recent APP Tour Collegiate Championships in, you guessed it, men’s singles. 

Also at Florida, then-senior Martin Michelsen took second place at DUPR’s individual nationals, losing out only to Shick. But the Coral Springs, FL native might not even be the best player on the Gators last season.

Fellow Gator Django Chassang, who took silver in doubles alongside Christopher Crouch, has his eyes on going pro. His DUPR doubles rating of 5.44 suggests that might not be so far fetched. He took silver in men’s singles at the APP Tour Collegiate Championships, losing out only to Foster.

Meanwhile, in Charlottesville, UVA’s national title run was propelled by a team effort more than any one player. The Cavaliers were powered junior and club president Connor Burns, juniors Alexandra McDonald and Eli Mautner, and senior David Bieger, law student Laurelei Singsank, who scored the game winning point. McDonald and Singsank also reached the semifinals in women’s doubles at the DUPR individual championships.

Lastly, we have to at least mention Ben Johns. No, he doesn’t play collegiately – he was already on the pro circuit by the time he started college. But he was the top ranked player in the world while still a student at the University of Maryland – he graduated in 2022, and a certain Georgia Johns is the star of the Terrapins' team right now.

Moving Forward 

Was the East’s shocking success at nationals a fluke or a sign that the region is severely underrated? That’s the biggest question surrounding the Eastern collegiate pickleball landscape going forward. If FAU, Florida State, Florida and Maryland can build off of the strong end to their respective seasons, then the region could emerge as a hotspot for the sport at the collegiate level.

On a similar note, all eyes will be on Virginia and whether the squad can replicate its late-season success and defend its title. With three of the five members of its championship-winning squad eligible to return next season, expect a strong push from UVA to go back-to-back.

Lastly, the region’s success last season may very well change how it’s seen by DUPR. It might even give the ratings organization-turned governing body a reason to roll out a new tournament or two in the region. As last season showed, there’s definitely a void there that DUPR is uniquely, and exceptionally, poised to fill.