Rafa Hewett and Blaine Hovenier competing for the Las Vegas Night Owls at MLP Virginia Beach.
The Las Vegas Night Owls will play two matches on Friday. Major League Pickleball

LIVE BLOG: Friday's results and news from MLP Virginia Beach

It's Day 2 at MLP Virginia Beach, and I've got all the latest updates from this exciting Challenger-only event.

Check back here throughout the day, as this article will be modified as results come in. 

You can watch the action for yourself on the MLP YouTube, starting at 9am EST.


12:55 p.m. ET: Play stopped due to rain.


11:30 a.m. ET: Night Owls outlast Aces as Brooklyn's DreamBreaker struggles continue

The Las Vegas Night Owls kicked off Friday’s Grandstand Court action with a DreamBreaker victory over the Brooklyn Aces.

When these two teams faced off at last week’s MLP New York City, the Night Owls dominated the DreamBreaker by a 21-5 score line.

Friday’s contest was much more competitive.

Trailing 14-18, Blaine Hovenier and Rafa Hewett secured back-to-back 3-1 rotations against Daniel de la Rosa and Pablo Tellez, respectively, to tie things up at 20-20.

From there, Judit Castillo took the next two points against Lina Padegimaite to close it out.

 

Hewett—despite being the only member of the team to save a match point—credited his teammates with the win.

“Everybody had my back today,” he said. “I was a little down because I failed to bring home wins in men’s and mixed, but in the DreamBreaker everyone came up clutch. At the end of the day, it comes down to if you have that dog in you, and I think we’ve all got that.”

The past few weeks have been rough for Brooklyn. They’re 0-7 since the start of MLP New York City, with five of those losses coming in DreamBreakers.

The Aces will look to get back on track against the SoCal Hard Eights later on Friday, while the Night Owls will look to improve to 3-0 when they take on the Atlanta Bouncers.


10:55 a.m. ET: Chicago sweeps Hard Eights to end SoCal's winning streak at 12

The Chicago Slice improved to 2-1 in Virginia Beach on Friday morning with a 4-0 sweep of the SoCal Hard Eights.

And they ended SoCal’s 12-match winning streak while doing it.

The Hard Eights took this matchup in a DreamBreaker the last time these teams played in Kansas City (when Martin Emmrich was filling in for Jack Munro for Chicago), but the Slice left no doubt in this one.

They started off with wins in both gender doubles matches, as Munro and Brendon Long improved to 7-1 in their last eight matches together.

That momentum carried Chicago to two victories in mixed doubles to complete the sweep over the team currently at the top of the Challenger level standings.

The Slice will be back in action on Friday afternoon against the Brooklyn Aces.