Pickleball Coming to Ocean City Next Week

Don Hepner's long quest to bring to Ocean City is finally complete.

The city has purchased two nets and will be taping lines for temporary Pickleball courts next to the Civic Center on the basketball courts. The work is planned for Sept. 8, and the courts should be ready to use the following day. 

“The easiest way to describe it is, it's sort of like playing pingpong on a table big enough to stand on,” Hepner told Patch earlier this year. “If you mix a little pingpong, badminton and tennis together, you get Pickleball.”

The sport was reportedly invented in a Seattle driveway in the 1960s and named for the mischievous dog who kept stealing the ball: Pickles.

Hepner says the sport accommodates players of all ages and abilities and can be a draw for vacationers, as it is in Florida, where he first played. He started approaching City Council in 2010 to ask about the possibility of creating Pickleball courts in Ocean City, and he persisted until council members agreed to explore the issue.

Less than a year later, it appears Hepner's mission may be complete.

On one basketball court, two Pickleball courts with removable nets can be created. The courts provide an ideal location where Pickleball can be played in the morning before basketball players show up to play at 2 or 3 p.m. on a typical day.

At the Sept. 8 meeting, Hepner plans to thank City Council for its initiative.

"If it works out and is going well, we will have an email site where people will be able to sign up for free introductory training clinics," Hepner said.

Many residents of Ocean City do not know what the sport is or how to play, but high school students play the sport in the winter in gym classes. 

As it gets cold in the winter, the courts might be moved into the Ocean City Sports and Civic Center, but that is yet to be determined, according to Lisa Rumer, a supervisor in charge of sports programs at the Civic Center.

The experiment may eventually lead to permanent courts somewhere in town.