Independent club operators in Indianapolis, Indiana, are piloting a USTA-style club vs. club league that keeps registration revenue inside the local club community — and they want other cities to copy it.
What if competing pickleball clubs in your city stopped acting like rivals and started acting like partners? That’s the premise behind a new collaborative league format taking shape in Indianapolis, Indiana — spearheaded by Chris Sears, the founder and owner of Indianapolis Pickleball Club (IPC), and Rick Witsken, part-owner of Third Shot Pickleball and a former ATP-level tennis player.
While Sears and Witsken helped lead the effort, the league was built through collaboration with several other club operators across the Indianapolis market, including Sue Estep of Dink House Carmel, Dave Rader of Go West Pickleball and Kelly Bodner of Pickle on Penn. Together, the group worked to create what they’re calling the USAP Indiana chapter — a club-versus-club competitive league modeled after the long-standing team tennis structure popularized by the USTA.
A Tennis Blueprint for Pickleball
The idea grew out of a shared frustration. Sears, a longtime USTA tennis league player himself, understood firsthand how team competition creates engagement that open play simply can’t replicate. The USTA model — where players pay a registration fee, get assigned to club-based teams, and compete for city, state and national championships — has driven consistent, predictable revenue to the organization and tennis clubs for decades. Sears saw no reason pickleball couldn’t work the same way.
The key difference: in the pickleball version, no outside governing body takes the registration fees. Instead, the club owners keep the money themselves.
Club Owners as Co-Owners of the League
To get the league off the ground, Sears reached out to fellow independent club operators around Indianapolis. The group formed an informal trade association they nicknamed “POFI” (Pickleball Owners Forum of Indianapolis), with Sears serving as de facto president and Kelly Bodner of Pickle on Penn as VP. They incorporated an LLC and branded their structure the USAP Indiana chapter.
“We’re all kind of competitors, but we’re not really,” said Sears. “We all have gotten to know each other.”
The revenue model is straightforward: registration fees are shared collectively among participating club owners. Each club also collects its own standard court fees on nights it hosts matches. No middleman, no third-party coordinator taking a cut.
“USTA makes a mint off of the registration fees,” said Sears. “So instead of USTA taking that in, we’re sharing the registration fees collectively amongst our group of club owners. And then we all individually get our normal court fees. That’s consistent steady revenue year in, year out, ideally.”
The Format: Stakes Are Everything
The league launched its pilot with 3.5 and 4.0 skill divisions — one team per club per division — with men’s, women’s and mixed formats planned as the program scales. Each match night, two clubs field four players each and compete in a round-robin doubles format, tracking individual game scores for standings. Tied matches are decided by a dreambreaker. Four sessions per year build toward city and state championships, with the long-term ambition of progressing teams regionally and nationally.
Sears is emphatic that stakes — not just organized play — are what drive player commitment. He pointed to Circle City Athletics (CCA), a non-pickleball-specific adult league operator in Indianapolis that manages roughly 2,000 pickleball teams, as proof of concept.
“I’ve never understood why people continue to go to CCA leagues when all these clubs exist now,” said Sears. “But they have a format that leads to something that matters, and people want to keep playing it. We need something that matters — that was the goal.”
He’s even candid about the shortcomings of his own club’s internal leagues: “I stopped playing in our own leagues,” said Sears. “They’re not playing for anything.”
The club-vs-club format, he argues, changes that calculus entirely.
To manage the operational complexity of a multi-club league, the group built a proprietary app called CourtPass. The platform handles roster management, captain communications, player availability, payments and standings tracking.
Going Regional — and Beyond
The Indianapolis pilot is already attracting attention from neighboring markets. The vision is a regional championship structure once individual city leagues are established.
Free agents are welcome too — players who don’t belong to any club can register and get assigned to a team. Sears sees this as both an inclusivity play and a quiet member recruitment tool for the clubs hosting them.
Between the extra exposure and potential revenue opportunities, the league can be a win-win for operators willing to organize a chapter in their own city.
“I swear, this would be the coolest thing ever if seven people were like, ‘Yeah, we want to do this,’ and go start their own chapter in Phoenix or something,” said Sears. “We’ll give you the technology. We’ll show you. We’ll give you the format. We’ll help you set it all up. But at the end of the day, it’s your chapter. You guys make the money off of it.”
An Industry Ethos Worth Spreading
Perhaps as importantly as the league format itself, Sears and Witsken are modeling a collaborative ownership culture that they hope becomes a defining characteristic of the pickleball industry.
“In the tennis industry, it’s been very standoffish,” Sears recalled Witsken saying. “This is our club. This is your club. Don’t talk to us. He was like, ‘I don’t want that to be the way for pickleball.’ And I was like, ‘I don’t want that either.’”
For independent club operators interested in learning more about starting a USAP chapter in their city, Sears welcomes outreach. He can be reached at chris@indianapolispickleballclub.com.
Gain a competitive advantage
Subscribe to Pickleball Innovators for insider tips, expert insight and the latest trends to help your pickleball business thrive.
With over a decade spent covering the business side of sports and fitness, Rachel Chonko brings a wealth of experience and a true passion for active communities to Peake Media. As Editor-in-Chief, she’s focused on helping pickleball clubs and fitness facilities thrive, from guiding growth strategies to showcasing the latest industry trends. Rachel also hosts the Club Solutions Magazine Podcast, where she interviews leaders in fitness and pickleball to share insights and success stories with the wider community to give her listeners a competitive edge.
After taking up pickleball herself, Rachel has come to appreciate the sport’s unique blend of social connection and active living — a mix that’s perfectly in line with her editorial philosophy. Connect with her on LinkedIn, or check out her articles below for a deep dive into the energy and culture driving pickleball’s rapid rise.
