Coming into this week’s MLP New York presented by Cleary Gottlieb, the Carolina Hogs had not won a match in over a month, with their last win coming on May 23 against the Bay Area Breakers. 

The squad was also short-handed, with two of their three rostered females—Nicole Conard and Aiko Yoshitomi—unavailable for this event. 

Per the 2026 Competition Structure, teams can add any player from the approved UPA player pool if two or more of their rostered players of the same gender are injured, instead of using designated on-site alternates: 

• “Between events, if a team has two rostered players of the same gender that are injured, ill or unable to attend, that team will be allowed to make a selection of one player from the available pool of UPA contracted players to participate during the event. The acquired player will be released after the event and available for pickup by another team for the next event. Any team that uses a substitute player from the UPA player pool will not receive a point penalty during matches. Player loans between teams are not permitted.”

Carolina chose to bring up 14-year-old Kelly Goodnow, who made her MLP debut on Thursday as the Hogs took on the Palm Beach Royals, who were fresh off a fourth-place finish at MLP St. Pete. 

Goodnow and Abbigal Hatton fell in women’s doubles as Tina Pisnik and Sofia Sewing earned their eighth straight win for Palm Beach, but it was all Hogs from there. 

After Michael Loyd/DJ Young defeated Casey Diamond/Tyson McGuffin in men’s doubles to even the match, Hatton and Young teamed up to beat Sewing and Diamond in the first mixed doubles game to give the Hogs a 2-1 advantage. 

It then came down to Goodnow and Loyd taking on the veteran duo of Pisnik and McGuffin, who have a combined 102 PPA Tour medals between them. 

Goodnow/Loyd certainly rose to the occasion in their first match together, taking an 11-9 thriller to give the Hogs a 3-1 victory in what might go down as the biggest upset of the 2026 season. 

Goodnow took a moment to reflect on the experience in a post-match interview. 

“It’s just surreal to me right now. I’m still processing, but it’s just so great to win it with such a supportive team. I’m just really excited.” 

It’s already been quite the summer for Goodnow, who earned her first career PPA Challenger title two weeks ago to become the youngest gold medalist in PPA Tour history. 

And on Thursday, she had an MLP debut that will be hard to forget. 

Despite some great results over recent weeks, the 14-year-old is focused on just enjoying her journey in professional pickleball. 

“Everything’s moving so fast, and I’m just glad to be along for the ride. This is just so crazy, but I’m really happy to be here.” 

The Hogs—and Goodnow—will be back in action on Friday with matches against the Dallas Flash and Brooklyn Pickleball Team. 

You can catch all the action on Pickleballtv.