Luc Pham beat top seed Christopher Haworth 4-11, 11-7, 11-8 to reach the Las Vegas quarter-finals, where he meets John Lucian Goins.
The short answer: Luc Pham came from a game down to beat No. 1 seed Christopher Haworth 4-11, 11-7, 11-8 in the Rate Las Vegas Open Round of 16 and faces John Lucian Goins in the quarter-finals. Christian Alshon meets Ben Johns, Federico Staksrud plays Gabriel Joseph and Hunter Johnson faces Roscoe Bellamy. Women’s singles will produce a new champion, as Anna Leigh Waters did not enter.
Luc Pham eliminated top seed Christopher Haworth to produce the defining result of the Rate Las Vegas Open Round of 16. Now the upset sits inside a wider Las Vegas story: opportunity has opened across both singles draws, outsiders are threatening deep doubles runs, and many of the sport’s established names remain positioned to take control.
Key takeaways
- Luc Pham recovered from a game down to beat No.1 seed Christopher Haworth 4-11, 11-7, 11-8 and will face John Lucian Goins for a place in the men’s singles semi-finals.
- Ben Johns and Federico Staksrud remain in the men’s singles draw, but the elimination of Haworth has opened a significant route through the top half.
- Genie Bouchard is back in the Las Vegas quarter-finals after reaching the women’s singles final here in 2025, with Lea Jansen waiting next.
- Anna Leigh Waters remains alive in both doubles events she entered as she continues her pursuit of career PPA title No.200.
- No.27 seeds Elliott Schupp and John Lucian Goins have reached the men’s doubles quarter-finals, while Sofia Sewing and Tina Pisnik have disrupted the women’s doubles draw.
There is a point in a tournament when the draw stops being a collection of possibilities and begins to reveal what the week might actually become.
At the Rate Las Vegas Open, Thursday was that day.
Luc Pham provided its defining moment, recovering from a game down to eliminate No.1 seed Christopher Haworth 4-11, 11-7, 11-8. Haworth had taken control of the opening game and arrived in Las Vegas after winning the Arizona Open in Mesa, where he recovered to beat Federico Staksrud in three games in the final. Pham changed the direction of Thursday’s match and, with it, an entire section of the men’s singles bracket.
For Pham, the result is significant in isolation. What makes Friday more interesting is what it has created.
He is now one victory from the semi-finals. John Lucian Goins stands between him and that breakthrough, while Christian Alshon and Ben Johns meet directly in the adjacent quarter-final. Elsewhere, Staksrud remains alive but must navigate Gabriel Joseph, and Hunter Johnson faces Roscoe Bellamy.
The same sense of opportunity runs through women’s singles, where eight players remain in a draw that is guaranteed to produce a different champion after Anna Leigh Waters chose not to enter. Genie Bouchard has returned to the quarter-finals in the city where she reached the final last season, while Kate Fahey, Kiora Kunimoto, Chao Yi Wang, Cailyn Campbell, Kaitlyn Christian, Milan Rane and Lea Jansen all have their own opening.
Doubles tells a slightly different story. There have been disruptions, but Waters, Johns, Anna Bright, Gabriel Tardio, Tyra Hurricane Black and Federico Staksrud are among the established contenders still positioned to take control.
Las Vegas therefore reaches its quarter-finals with two competing forces at work. Thursday opened the bracket. Friday decides who can actually walk through it.
Pham turns an upset into an opportunity
Beating the No.1 seed is one thing. What Pham does next could determine how this Las Vegas run is remembered.
Haworth appeared to have settled quickly when he took the first game 11-4, but Pham responded 11-7 and then completed the comeback 11-8 in the decider. It was a striking reversal against the player who arrived as the top seed after winning in Mesa.
WPM identified Haworth as one of the central figures in the tournament before play began, with the question being whether he could carry his Arizona form into another Open. Our Las Vegas preview noted that his Mesa victory had come after winning the final eight points of the deciding game against Staksrud.
Pham has now ended any possibility of a repeat title.
The victory also guarantees that this quarter of the bracket will produce a less expected semi-finalist. Goins created his own opportunity by defeating Yates Johnson 13-11, 11-5, meaning Pham against Goins is not simply the aftermath of an upset. It is a match carrying a substantial reward for two players suddenly presented with a route into the final four.
That is particularly interesting given the story of Goins’ week. WPM’s Round of 32 review examined how Yates Johnson’s victory over Connor Garnett had already opened this section. Goins has now taken advantage of that first opening and has the chance to go considerably further.
The next quarter-final could hardly offer a greater contrast.
Alshon beat Jaume Martinez Vich 11-4, 11-8 and now faces Johns, who moved efficiently past Dylan Frazier 11-7, 11-3. It leaves one half of the draw with an intriguing shape: Pham or Goins will advance from one quarter, while Johns and Alshon must remove each other in the other.
The bottom half has also refused to become straightforward.
Staksrud defeated Rafael Lenhard 11-5, 11-7 and now faces Gabriel Joseph, who eliminated Zane Ford 11-5, 11-5. Hunter Johnson reached the last eight with an 11-7, 11-8 victory over Eric Oncins, while Bellamy had to recover after Cason Campbell levelled their match with an 11-4 second game. Bellamy took the decider 11-8.
Staksrud and Johns provide the obvious established reference points among the remaining eight, but the story of this draw has already become the number of players attempting to force themselves deeper into the tournament.
Pham has made the biggest move so far. Now he has to back it up.
Bouchard returns to familiar Las Vegas territory
Women’s singles carries a different kind of uncertainty.
Waters won the title here in 2025 but is not contesting singles this week, leaving top seed Kate Fahey and the rest of the field with an opportunity that does not normally exist when Waters occupies the bracket.
Eight players now remain.
Fahey dispatched Aiko Yoshitomi 11-3, 11-1 and meets Kiora Kunimoto, who beat Jalina Ingram 11-4, 11-9. Chao Yi Wang came through a tight opening game against Zoey Weil before completing a 13-11, 11-5 victory and will face Cailyn Campbell, who removed Isabella Dunlap 11-6, 11-8.
Kaitlyn Christian had to recover against Sofia Sewing. After losing the opener 5-11, Christian responded 11-3, 11-9 and now meets Milan Rane.
Then there is Bouchard.
Las Vegas already occupies an important place in the story of her pickleball career. In 2025 she beat Jorja Johnson in the quarter-finals and Fahey in the semi-finals before losing 11-5, 11-5 to Waters in the gold-medal match. The PPA recorded it as Bouchard’s second career singles final.
Twelve months later, she is back in the last eight.
Bouchard beat Mary Brascia 11-9, 11-5 on Thursday, having previously handled Estee Widdershoven 11-6, 11-2. The significance of those results is beginning to move beyond the original novelty of an elite tennis player trying to establish herself in professional pickleball.
Her next opponent provides a serious examination of that progress.
Lea Jansen has conceded only 11 points across her last two matches, beating Circa Luna Sacca 11-4, 11-1 before defeating Lacy Schneemann 11-5, 11-5.
For Bouchard, another Las Vegas quarter-final reinforces the evidence that this venue suits her. Beating Jansen would turn another promising week into a second consecutive Las Vegas semi-final.
Waters and Johns restore some order
Mixed doubles provided the clearest counterpoint to the disruption elsewhere.
Anna Leigh Waters and Ben Johns allowed Jack Sock and Lea Jansen little opportunity to establish themselves, winning 11-2, 11-5. The top seeds now meet Nicolas Acevedo and Isabella Dunlap, who produced a notable result of their own by beating Eric Oncins and Catherine Parenteau 11-4, 11-5.
That makes the quarter-final more interesting than the seedings alone suggest. Acevedo and Dunlap have already removed a dangerous partnership. Their reward is the most demanding test available in the draw.
Waters also carries a larger storyline through the tournament. She arrived in Las Vegas on 198 career PPA Tour titles and, because she is not playing singles, must win both mixed doubles with Johns and women’s doubles with Bright if she is to reach 200 this week. The PPA’s tournament storylines identified the milestone before the event began.
Tyra Hurricane Black and Gabriel Tardio were equally emphatic in defeating Ting Chieh Wei and CJ Klinger 11-3, 11-3. They now face Will Howells and Meghan Dizon, who survived one of Thursday’s tighter mixed matches against Dylan Frazier and Alix Truong, winning 11-6, 10-12, 11-9.
The other quarter-finals bring Hayden Patriquin and Anna Bright against Federico Staksrud and Kate Fahey, while Tina Pisnik and Christian Alshon face Jessie Irvine and Andrei Daescu.
There are obvious potential blockbuster matches further ahead. Thursday’s results are a useful warning against getting there too soon.
Men’s doubles may have Friday’s deepest quarter-final field
If one draw deserves particular attention beyond singles, it may be men’s doubles.
Gabriel Tardio and Ben Johns remain at the top of the bracket, but Clayton Powell and Rafa Hewett demonstrated that their passage will not necessarily be comfortable. Tardio and Johns edged the opener 12-10, lost the second 7-11 and had to reset before winning the decider 11-6.
The result matters partly because Johns and Tardio arrived with an imposing history together. They are the defending Las Vegas champions, and the PPA entered the week describing their 2026 partnership as perfect to that point.
Their quarter-final opponents experienced something similar on Thursday.
Will Howells and Pablo Tellez were pushed to three by Casey Diamond and Max Freeman before prevailing 11-9, 9-11, 11-7. Neither quarter-finalist therefore arrives untouched, and the top seeds are guaranteed another substantial examination.
Alongside them, Jaume Martinez Vich and Nicolas Acevedo face Dylan Frazier and Len Yang. Martinez Vich and Acevedo defeated Eric Oncins and CJ Klinger 11-7, 11-9, while Frazier and Yang accelerated dramatically after a competitive opening game against Tyler Loong and Rafael Lenhard, winning 11-9, 11-0.
The bottom half contains even more intrigue.
Christian Alshon and Andrei Daescu meet Augustus Ge and Jack Sock, while Hayden Patriquin and Federico Staksrud face Elliott Schupp and John Lucian Goins.
Alshon and Daescu arrived in Las Vegas as the Arizona champions after their recent switch to Alshon on the left and Daescu on the right, a change WPM examined before the tournament. They now face another test against a Ge-Sock partnership that has already played its way deep into the draw.
Schupp and Goins, meanwhile, are the No.27 seeds yet stand one victory from the semi-finals after beating Mohaned Alhouni and Luc Pham 11-2, 11-7.
Goins has therefore created one of the less obvious individual stories of the tournament. He is in the singles quarter-finals, where he faces Pham, and the men’s doubles quarter-finals alongside Schupp. A player who began the tournament outside its most obvious headline names now has two separate routes towards Saturday’s semi-finals.
That is precisely the kind of opportunity Las Vegas has begun to produce.
Can Sewing and Pisnik disrupt women’s doubles again?
At the top of women’s doubles, the hierarchy has proved harder to disturb.
Waters and Bright conceded only three points against Abbigal Hatton and Jalina Ingram, winning 11-3, 11-0. Their quarter-final opponents, Layne Sleeth and Alix Truong, had a much more demanding route, beating Lucy Kovalova and Mari Humberg 11-7, 7-11, 11-9.
Black and Catherine Parenteau were almost as convincing, beating Maggie and Mary Brascia 11-4, 11-3.
Their next opponents, however, have already altered the bracket.
Sofia Sewing and Tina Pisnik eliminated No.9 seeds Kaitlyn Christian and Allyce Jones 11-9, 11-6. The result is particularly interesting because the PPA identified Sewing and Pisnik before the tournament as a partnership worth watching after their success together in Major League Pickleball.
Now they have the opportunity to make that partnership matter in the later stages of a PPA event.
Elsewhere, Ting Chieh Wei and Meghan Dizon meet Isabella Dunlap and Genie Erokhina, while Lacy Schneemann and Kate Fahey face Kiora Kunimoto and Judit Castillo.
Castillo is another name worth following.
Only days removed from completing a triple crown at the PPA Tour Europe event in Barcelona, where she won singles, women’s doubles with Hannah Blatt and mixed doubles with Zane Navratil, the Spaniard has crossed directly into another PPA environment and reached the final eight of women’s doubles in Las Vegas.
Her singles run ended against Daria Walczak earlier this week, preventing any repeat of Barcelona’s sweep, but the doubles quarter-final provides another useful measure of whether that European form can travel into a deeper US field.
Friday is about converting opportunity
Upsets are remembered because they interrupt what was expected. Runs matter because they replace it.
That is the distinction facing Pham on Friday.
Whatever happens against Goins, defeating the No.1 seed after dropping the first game is already a significant Las Vegas result. Another victory would take him into the semi-finals and transform one exceptional afternoon into one of the tournament’s defining campaigns.
Bouchard faces a similar opportunity against Jansen. Goins has two chances to reach the final four. Schupp and Goins can turn a No.27 seeding into a men’s doubles semi-final. Sewing and Pisnik have already removed Christian and Jones and now get the chance to test themselves against Black and Parenteau.
Across the net stand many of the players accustomed to ending tournaments on podiums.
Waters remains alive in both doubles disciplines she entered. Johns is still competing in singles, mixed doubles and men’s doubles. Staksrud has survived in singles, mixed doubles and men’s doubles. Bright and Tardio remain positioned for multiple deep runs.
The progressive format means all five professional draws now move together into the quarter-finals, with the PPA broadcast schedule listing Friday’s coverage from the Darling Tennis Center on PickleballTV.
That tension now defines Las Vegas.
One group has been given an opening. The other is trying to close it.
Thursday supplied the shocks. Friday determines whether they changed the tournament.
Frequently asked questions
Luc Pham, 4-11, 11-7, 11-8.
Pham v Goins, Alshon v Johns, Staksrud v Joseph and Hunter Johnson v Bellamy.
No. She did not enter women’s singles but is in both doubles events.
Further reading
- Las Vegas Starts to Bite as Seeds Fall Before PPA Round of 16
- PPA Las Vegas Open 2026 Preview: Can Mesa’s Challengers Repeat?
- Rate Las Vegas Open: Early Casualties Clear the Stage for the Heavyweights
- Judit Castillo Wins Barcelona Triple Crown With Zane Navratil
- Official Rate Las Vegas Open Storylines
Chris Beaumont
Founder and Editor-in-ChiefChris Beaumont is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of World Pickleball Magazine, published by World Pickleball Media Ltd. He follows the global game closely, reporting on news, developments, stories and tournaments from all five continents. He also hosts the World Pickleball…
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