2025 A6W National Championship
Mission Hills Croquet Club
November 16-22, 2025
The United States Croquet Association American rules croquet Nationals was hosted at the Mission Hills country club in Palm Springs California the week before Thanksgiving. A field of 32 players participated in two events. The first three days were doubles and the next four days were singles format. The field of players came from all corners of the US, Canada, Virginia, Oklahoma and Texas.
This years field consisted of several past participants and ten past title holders. It was heavily weighted toward the Championship field with only seven First Flight players. It was organized into 4 blocks of players with groups of 7 to 8 players with 12 advancing to the Championship double elimination knockout format, 6 advanced to the First Flight knockout, and 7 advanced to the Championship Plate knockout.
This year’s Nationals had 5 women signed up to participate in Championship Flight. This may be a record, but it is not uncommon for women to participate on an equal level with men in the sport of croquet. The Peyton Ballenger Award is given to the woman that completes at the highest finishing spot in the Championship flight of the Nationals. Only 12 of the 31 participants qualified for the knockout ladder and while none of the woman qualified for that knockout they all competed in the Championship plate. Beverley Cardo ended up at the top spot in block play with 2 wins and all the rest with 1 win. In the plate, she also managed to play the best and make the finals on Saturday losing to my partner Patrick Sweeney. Congratulations to Beverley on her excellent play and in winning the award. She will receive an engraved trophy after the tournament.
Randy Cardo, Bev’s husband, worked his way through the championship playoff to a best of three match against Sherif Abdelwahab. Sherif and Randy both hold National titles and it proved to be a good matchup. Sherif won the first game and Randy won the 2nd game both with flawless play and all around breaks. In the third game, the match was close all the way up to the end and Sherif pulled out the victory against Randy earning him his 10th National title.
Patrick Sweeney took home the Plate title after defeating Joshua Lassiter and Beverley Cardo.
In First Flight, Ron Eccles defeated John Donohue in their finals on Saturday.
In Doubles, Stuart Lawrence and Brian Cumming worked their way through the playoffs earlier in the week to meet Rich Lamm and Rodney Lassiter. Brian and Stuart won the event and take home the National Doubles trophy for their third time, each holding other national titles.
In the Doubles plate event, Adam and Joshua Lassiter took the title from Jim Houser and Britt Ruby one of our oldest titlist holders who won the Nationals in 1997.
CHAMPIONSHIP SINGLES
01. Sherif Abdelwahab
02. Randy Cardo
03. Brian Cumming
03. Danny Huneycutt
05. Macey White
05. Matt Smith
07. Rich Lamm
07. Steve Scalpone
09. Adam Lassiter
09. John Brown
09. Paul Bennett
09. Stuart Lawrence
13. Rich Curtis
14. Doug Grimsley
15. Patrick Sweeney
16. Carl Uhlman
17. Jim Houser
19. Beverly Cardo
20. Rodney Lassiter
21. Josh Lassiter
22. Britt Ruby
23. Nancy Crouch
25. Donna Dixon
29. Sandra Knuth
FIRST FLIGHT SINGLES
01. Ron Eccles
02. John Donohue
03. Randy Lassiter
04. Jon Spaulding
05. Bill Sullivan
CHAMPIONSHIP PLATE SINGLES
01. Patrick Sweeney
02. Beverly Cardo
03. Nancy Crouch
03. Josh Lassiter
04. Rodney Lassiter
05. Sandra Knuth
06. Donna Dixon
CHAMPIONSHIP DOUBLES
01. Brian Cumming & Stuart Lawrence
02. Rich Lamm & Rodney Lassiter
03. Sandra Knuth & Sherif Abdelwahab
04. Danny Huneycutt & Randy Cardo
05. Paul Bennett & Patrick Sweeney
05. Rich Curtis & Doug Grimsley
07. Nancy Crouch & Macey White
07. Beverly Cardo & John Brown
CHAMPIONSHIP DOUBLES PLATE
01. Adam Lassiter & Josh Lassiter
02. Britt Ruby & Jim Houser
03. Ron Eccles & Steve Scalpone
03. Donna Dixon & John Donohue
05. Randy Lassiter & Jon Spaulding
PEYTON BALLENGER AWARD
01. Beverley Cardo
02. Nancy Crouch
03. Donna Dixon
04. Sandra Knuth