Live Now! PPA Vegas Cup

Rate Vegas Cup

The PPA tour is back in Las Vegas for a progressive draw at one of the original PPA venues: the Darling Tennis Center. Round of 64 is underway now, and we’ve got all the early round recaps & what to watch the rest of the week.

Race to the Finals

As was announced last month, the PPA season has been adjusted to run after the conclusion of MLP championships through April, with Finals in early May before the next MLP season commences.

With this change, event points that contribute to The Race (qualifier for Finals in May) will continue to accumulate through the Atlanta Slam in April 2026. That makes Vegas the 7th event of the 2025-2026 season.

(It is unclear how points from earlier 2025 events, before the calendar adjustment, will contribute to the Race, if at all. But those events will continue to count toward Rank and seeding. Review the full calendar below.)

Women’s Singles

• Lea Jansen (5) is coming in off a win in last week’s LT Open Singles tournament, held at LifeTime Peachtree Corners. She battled Parris Todd for gold in a best-of-5 matchup which was extremely close in each game (13-11, 5-11, 12-10, 11-6). Can she ride this high and make another finals? If she does, the road goes through Anna Leigh, which will be no easy feat.

• Kiora Kunimoto (33) upset Mya Bui (27) and next faces Kate Fahey. This 17-year-old tennis player from Hawaii just upset Christa Gecheva in Virginia Beach, and beat Mari Humberg in Sacramento.

• Speaking of Mari (26), she was just upset by Isabella Dunlap (37), who will move on to play Lea Jansen in R32 tomorrow. Isabella, a former collegiate tennis player, won singles gold earlier this month at the PPA Challenger Rock City event in Little Rock.

Men’s Singles

• Hunter Johnson is still looking for his first gold after reaching #1 in men’s singles. He needs to declutter his mind from past… ahem… distractions and lock in to push through the bracket.

• Making quick work of this event is Chris Haworth (12), who only signed with PPA in July, and he’s made it to medal rounds in 3 of his first 4 events as a signed pro (lost bronze match in Cincinnati, won bronze in Sacramento, and gold in Virginia Beach).

• Several injuries and withdrawals have marred men’s singles: Donald Young (retired), Pablo Tellez (withdrew - replaced by Benjamin Bramblett), Tyson McGuffin (withdrew - replaced by Pally Ray), Mota Alhouni (withdrew - replaced by Zach Drost), Max Freeman (withdrawal, forfeited match), Daniel Jensen  (withdrawal, forfeited match), Yuta Funemizu (retired).

Mixed Doubles

• Anna Bright and Hayden Patriquin (3) are on court together again; their last PPA event together was the OC Cup, where they took bronze. They’ll try to capitalize on their MLP magic, but face steep competition from Ben & AL, the Johnsons, and Tyra & Christian.

• Aforementioned Isabella Dunlap played with her fiance, Andre Mercado. While they successfully took down Sam Querry & partner Luana Stanciu in R128, they unfortunately had to face Ben & AL right after, where they lost 3-11, 1-11.

• Look out for Mad Drops teammates Jade Kawamoto & Hunter Johnson (22) who could make a run, but have a tough draw facing Ben & AL in R16, should they beat Meghan Dizon & Jaume in R32.

• Grayson Goldin & Hannah Blatt (43) upset #23 AJ Koller & Kaitlyn Christian; next, they face Pablo Tellez & Zoey Wang (15).

• Another surprising upset was Lindsey Newman & Steve Deakin (39) taking down Lucy & Matt (27) 11-8, 12-10. Much to her disappointment (prob), that means Lindsey has to stick around at the tournament another day. 🙃

Women’s Doubles

• Bright & Waters (1) are back again to continue their reign, facing Jorja Johnson & Rachel Rohrabacher (2), Parris & Tyra (3), or Jade & Catherine (4) at the top of each corner of the bracket.

• We saw a rather uneventful R64 (no upsets) but are excited to see some of the new names compete in a fierce bracket: Isabella Dunlap plays with Mary Monson, a 16-year-old college student who plays pickleball at Utah Tech. Kiora Kunimoto & Giovanna Morelli (a lefty from Jupiter, FL) won their R64 matchup and move on to play Jade & Catherine. Together they won silver at the Rock City PPA Challenger event.

Men’s Doubles

• Once again, we’re seeing a lot of dominant, established partnerships here: Ben & Gabe, Christian & Andrei, and Fed & Hayden. PLUS another reunion of BFFs Dylan Frazier & JW Johnson, who won gold in Sacramento after nearly a year apart.

• Now this is just fun: bros Yates & Hunter Johnson will face Zane² (Ford & Navratil). The Zanes have played just once before: at PPA OC Cup, where they didn’t make it past R32.

• While there were a few R64 upsets, the most notable, perhaps, was qualifier winners Rafael Lenhard & Troy Akin taking down Jack Sock & Eric Roddy in three games (2-11, 12-10, 11-9). Together, they took gold at the Rock City PPA Challenger, and you may remember Lenhard’s name from his singles run at the PPA OC Cup, where he beat Noe Khlif, Zane Navratil, and Ben Johns.

Coverage for the Rate Vegas Cup will be broadcast on PickleballTV, now available on YouTube TV!

Side court streaming will be broadcast on YouTube.

Make a plan to come to a PPA event, and get a discount with our code: KOTC

Upcoming events:

10/20-26 Vegas Cup, Las Vegas - going on now!

11/3 - 9 World Championships, Dallas

11/18 - 23 Lakeland Open, Lakeland FL

12/16 - 21 Daytona Beach Open, Holly Hill FL ft. Junior PPA Finals

Episode 167: Weekly Round-up

Watch Jimmy battle a fly (yes, literally) while recapping the LifeTime Open and doing a full run-down of the Rate Vegas Cup. Don’t say he can’t multi-task.