Oakville, ON — The Canadian National Pickleball League (CNPL) opens its fourth season May 9 and 10 in Toronto, and Total Sport Solutions is proud to return as a partner of Toronto United Pickleball Club for the fourth consecutive year.
Season four opens May 9 and 10 in Toronto, where all eight CNPL franchises will compete at what organizers are calling the biggest professional pickleball event in the city’s history. Toronto United is hosting, with more than 500 fans expected each day at The Picklr Toronto West, a brand new state-of-the-art facility in Etobicoke. The club moved 250 early bird tickets in under 10 days, a sign of just how fast the appetite for professional pickleball is growing in Canada.
“We’ve been with Toronto United since day one, and what keeps us there is what they do off the court. Getting into malls, putting paddles in kids’ hands, growing the sport from the ground up. That’s what this partnership is really about.”
The club won the league’s inaugural championship and returned to the finals in year three. Their roster heading into season four retains the core that has defined the program since the beginning, including captain and year-one MVP Matthew Kawamoto, alongside new additions from this year’s draft.
That stability extends to the partnership with Total Sport Solutions, which has supported the club since its first season. For Toronto United owner and general manager Ricky Liorti, having an industry leader in their corner has shaped what the club is able to do both on and off the court.
“Total Sport Solutions has been with us since day one through the highs of winning in year one to the lows of year two and back to the finals in year three,” said Liorti. “Not many brands can say that. We want to win for them.”
That off-court commitment has included Toronto United’s Pickleball in the Mall events, where the club has introduced more than 250 people to the sport through free community activations at Cadillac Fairview properties across the city. Total Sport Solutions has been a key enabler of that programming, helping the club pursue what Liorti calls its mission to win off the court as much as on it.
Season four also marks a first for the CNPL. The league will travel to the Maritimes for the first time, with a regular season split scheduled for Stratford, Prince Edward Island. Events continue approximately every three weeks through the summer, with the regular season wrapping in Vancouver at the end of August and the championship finals to follow in September.
For Total Sport Solutions, the Official Court Supplier of Pickleball Ontario and a CNPL sponsor, the league’s national reach mirrors what the company sees playing out in communities across the country every day.
“Pickleball brings people together in a way that very few sports can,” Lintott added. “When you see a professional league growing into new provinces and drawing bigger crowds every season, it reflects something we see in communities every day. People want to play.”
Season four of the CNPL opens May 9 and 10 in Toronto. For the full season schedule and event information, visit cnpl.ca/schedule.
I’m surprised, looking back, that my parents would send me so far from home. To the grocery store blocks away, to friends’ houses across town. Today? I would never let my kids roam that far from the house. It’s just a different world now.
The streets feel busier. There are more cars parked everywhere. The old model of outdoor play (kids disappearing for hours, roaming freely, organizing their own games) is mostly gone. Most parents want their kids outside, but also close. Active, but within sight.
Screens are everywhere now, and we all know the challenge that creates. But in my ten years of installing custom backyard court projects across Southern Ontario and work across Canada, I’ve noticed something important. When you give kids a reason to go outside that actually appeals to them, they often choose it over their devices.
Not always. Not every time. But consistently enough that parents call me months after installation and say the same thing: “My kids are outside playing again.”