What’s the Score?
In a thrilling showcase of international talent, Team Hardware has claimed the title at the Australian Open Pickleball Slam in Melbourne. The team, anchored by Asia’s top-ranked player Phuc Huynh, emerged victorious after a nail-biting final against Team Hosier that required a decisive tie-breaker to settle the score. The event, held concurrently with tennis’s first Grand Slam of the year, featured 28 elite competitors battling for a share of a lucrative AUS $100,000 prize purse.
Hit it Deeper!
Returning for its second consecutive year, the Australian Open Pickleball Slam has solidified its reputation as a premier event in the Asia-Pacific region. Organised alongside the tennis Australian Open, the tournament drew significant attention to the growing sport, utilising a format that tested both individual brilliance and team chemistry.
The competition featured seven squads: Team Hardware, Team Hosier, Team Degraves, Team Flinders, Team Duckboard, and Team Guilford. The structure of the tournament was unforgiving, beginning with a single round-robin group stage where every point mattered. Team Hardware and Team Hosier quickly established themselves as the teams to beat, finishing as the top two seeds after the league phase. Hardware had earlier made a statement with decisive victories over Team Duckboard and Team Guilford, though their matches against Hosier in the group stages were fiercely contested, foreshadowing the drama to come in the final.
The championship match lived up to the hype, evolving into a tense tug-of-war. Team Hosier, led by American veteran Ryler DeHeart, put up a tremendous fight. The final reached a critical deadlock after Hosier’s duo of Sofia Sewing and Zach Grabovic defeated Hardware’s Andie Dikosavljevic and Harrison Brown 20–13 in Game 8, forcing the tie.
However, the heroics of Phuc Huynh, the World No. 4 and the tournament’s sole Asian representative, proved to be the difference-maker. Earlier in the tie, Huynh had kept his team afloat with a vital 22–18 singles victory over DeHeart in Game 2. He then paired with Harrison Brown to edge out DeHeart and Grabovic in a high-scoring 33–30 thriller in Game 6, which had given Hardware a temporary 4–2 advantage.
The title was ultimately decided in the final moments of the tie-breaker. In a conclusion that left spectators on the edge of their seats, Team Hardware held their nerve to win the decider 19–18, securing the championship and the bragging rights. Alongside Huynh, the winning roster included Harrison Brown, Andie Dikosavljevic, and Nicola Schoeman.
The event was also notable for its international flavour, drawing players from the USA, New Zealand, Canada, and the Netherlands to compete alongside Australia’s best.
The World Pickleball Verdict
This victory is a massive statement for Phuc Huynh and Asian pickleball at large. Coming off a season captaining the Bengaluru Blasters in the Indian Pickleball League, where his team performed consistently but missed the title, Huynh has now proven he can close out major tournaments on the big stage.
The Australian Open Pickleball Slam is also proving to be a masterstroke in marketing. By hitching its wagon to the Australian Open tennis tournament, pickleball is gaining visibility among traditional racquet sports fans. The “Slam” format—combining international stars like DeHeart and Huynh with local talent—creates a compelling narrative that transcends borders. The tight 19–18 finish in the final is the kind of drama the sport needs to capture a television audience. For Team Hardware, this win is a testament to resilience; for the sport in the region, it is confirmation that the level of play in the Asia-Pacific circuit is rising rapidly to meet Western standards.
Chris Beaumont is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of World Pickleball Magazine. Chris follows the global game closely, reporting on the latest news, developments, stories and tournaments from all five continents. He also hosts the World Pickleball Podcast, interviewing people at all levels of pickleball. Chris is also an avid player, currently struggling to make the breakthrough from 4.0 to 4.5.