Michael Loyd booked his spot in his first career PPA Tour final with an 11-7, 11-8 victory over No. 5 seed Quang Duong.

The No. 21 seed carried the momentum from his prior victories over Ben Johns and JW Johnson into Saturday’s bout, which saw him sprint to the victory thanks to huge serves and dipping drives that allowed him to attack on his fifth shots.

That helped him take the first game and get out to a 9-2 lead in the second, but Duong surged back into it and brought the score to 8-10.

Not deterred by the threat of a potential Game 3, Loyd got the serve back and closed out the triumph at the second time of asking.

Saturday’s result is especially sweet for Loyd, since he lost 2-11, 2-11 the last time he faced Duong in the semifinals of the Rate Championships in Las Vegas.

“I thought I had a better read on the patterns,” he said of his performance. “I watched film from some of the matches he’s played throughout the past couple months and just felt like I had a good gameplan. I was trying to knife the volleys and get them down so that he couldn’t come in and shake-and-bake off his own ball.”

Now just one win away from capturing his first career PPA Tour title, Loyd will face Federico Staksrud on Championship Sunday.

Federico Staksrud outdueled No. 8 seed Hunter Johnson 11-13, 11-5, 11-3 in the day’s only singles semifinal to go three games.

Missed returns were the top seed’s downfall in the first game, but he got back to his usual style of clean pickleball in Games and 2 and 3 to secure the win.

Another challenge for Staksrud was figuring out to do with his third shots; Johnson notably doesn’t come into the net off the return as much as other players, so that created some different patterns for the Argentinian to adjust to.

“[Hunter] stays back a lot, so I had to actually serve and then come in, which required a lot of extra work on the legs,” he shared.

This win keeps Staksrud’s Triple Crown hopes alive in the Lone Star State.

He will look to make it to Championship Sunday in mixed doubles and men’s doubles later in the day, where he’ll play with Rachel Rohrabacher and Matt Wright, respectively.