NEWS

Mitch Granger:

I'm from Northbrook, Illinois. I play my paddle at Exmoor Country Club in Highland Park. I have been playing paddle pretty much my whole life. My father, Ed Granger, got me started in paddle. He was a Director of Tennis and Paddle here in the Chicagoland area. I see it as a really big honor to carry my dad's torch. I grew up watching him play, seeing him interact with the community and his friends, guys like Mike Rahaley, Dave Keevins, Brian Uhlein, and Mike Marino. All those guys from Chicago’s paddle days of old. I would watch him play with them, against them, for them. It was really important to me post-college that I would carry that torch.

Also, the community is really cool. I know we hear that answer a lot. But it is really fun. After college tennis, it is great to be able to compete and to be able to do it with people that you know and love and are going to be lifelong friends and competitors alongside you. 

It is hard to say what my goals are. I just want to reach my potential. It sounds cliche. But at the end of the day, you want to leave this life knowing that you gave it your best, right? It's just reaching my absolute potential. I don't know what that is yet. 

Off the court, I love to read. I love to write. Those are some individual pursuits of mine. I love spending time with my fiancée Spencer Caravaggio. We built a great home together in Northbrook. We're getting married in October. So, we’re building a life together. That's something that's new to us, being engaged and then becoming married, and then who knows what happens next after that. 

I've got two favorite paddle memories. The first is that last match I played with my dad. We were in the consolation finals in Indianapolis. We knew it was going to be his last match. He was going through injuries, hip surgeries, and we eked out a third-set win in the consolation finals to get ninth. We hugged each other and got teary-eyed—we knew that was it for us as competitive paddle players. Memory two was getting ninth place at the 2022 National Championships with Alex Lambropolous. We had a great run, in the main draw, in the back draw, and it felt really good. It felt like a pinnacle—not reaching the mountain top because we still want more—but finishing top 10 in the country at Nationals was a really cool moment.