Johns/Tardio vs Daescu/Staksrud at the Zimmer Biomet Cape Coral Open

Let's play pickleball. They wanted to hit that last ball with the backhand, but he understood, and maybe nine months ago he would have, and now he defers. Second term. 64-4 for Ben and Gabe, Adam. Decent, decent. These two teams have not played. It's just, as I mentioned, tournament two, 6-2 for Andre and Betty. Come on. And a little glance up to the roof for Betty after that handspeak. Very proud of himself. Yes, he is, and we're proud of you, too. Very close to catching the shirt, Andre. 1-0-1. Adam, we have about 45 minutes before the sun sets, and then things are going to change here. Boys. Let's not forget, last tournament, that Andre and Gabe won it all together. No way. They couldn't believe it. Ben did not even see the ball, and that is the kind of reaction speed that he has. He's just smiling because he literally just put the paddle out, and let's not forget who won last year. I'll share that after this. We have all the combinations. It was Ben and right-side Andre that won here at Cape Coral. Their partnership started actually in Missoula, where we'll be next week. Play from Gabe moving forward. I know Ben got the glory, but Gabe coming from the baseline to the kitchen line is terrifying. And somehow he made a save and went back to it. Very difficult to find that spot. I understand Gabe hit it back, not a forehand, but that was well off of his body. Chance all the way cross-court. I thought for sure a soft shot was coming. Went for it. Gabe went for it. Yeah, great handspeed again from the fellas. We'll be seeing that throughout. Caught a piece of stacks, right, I think. Clipped the tape and then the paddle. Would have been really interesting to see what would have happened if the net didn't get involved. 2-1-1. A bit of third and fifth issues in that mixed doubles tight win earlier. More than a bit for crunch time moments. And sends it off the bounce. Right. Pretty good amount of ball movement with the soft stuff at the kitchen early. See if for sure concrete pattern establishes itself throughout. Pretty from Gabe. So tough. Had to time it so well to take that counter back through the middle. Really nice handle of the first ball by Gabe's partner, Ben Johns, too. Andre slowing down the pace. 4-1-2. Can't get there yet. 2, Adam. Of course. Oh, my goodness gracious. Load up and fire the cannon and tags the Argentinian. And Ben remembers a big part of Staxrude and Hayden Patrick when beating them at Worlds at the end of 2025 was Staxrude's offense straight ahead against Ben. Shot out. And that offense that I mentioned was mostly coming out of the air. And Staxrude has fired. His only offense has been off the bounce up into this point. That was awkward, but they get the point, finally get to 2. 2-6-1. Second serve. Staxrude will play for a singles title tomorrow, hoping to have two shots at gold. For Dave Tardio. What a location from a pretty low position from Andre. Fifth. Yes, sir. Gabe forgot to slide on that one. It wasn't home. Shot out. Unbelievable, really. Yes. I mean, there's nothing else to say, yes. Third was nice. The fifth was everything that you want to get forward. That's in there. That's just the best shot in the history of pickleball right there. The backhand out of the air, you have no idea where it's going. It's an issue if it's coming at the shoulder. But if you can find the hip, you have almost no chance. Second serve. Ben's got a nice aggressive mindset here, it seems, for his team. Because we were used to him playing such a huge amount of court with his brother, Colin, and that is not necessary with Gabe. And the thing is, is when you're responsible for less court, you can actually find more offense on the backhand wing for him. When he's on the move, he can't take as many balls out of the air. That was probably going to work, too. Ben had to bring the paddle over there at the last second. I'm not sure, to your point, he would have gotten it there, but it is 9-3. 9-3-2. 10-3-2. Finally gets a ball up, and Andre makes him pay. So a game point saved. 3-10-1. I mean, when it gets violent, it gets very violent. Ferocity. This looks like armed body for a second. Watch Gabe go with the punch when the ball clips the tape. It never made it to him, but, boy, was he ready regardless. That was awesome. Game point, too. What? That's going in. Yo, for sure. It's not a lob. That's a speed up. 10-3-2. Wow. Game point, three. Okay. That's been the only problem with Ben's game here in game one, and a couple missed thirds. 3-10-1. Second serve. Stacked through. That is clipping his paddle right around his knee. The action and spin that Gabe is getting, you can't believe that the ball is that low when he's hitting it that hard. From that close. Good night. Great take. Sets up the partner, and I think that's kind of what Ben was telling us, the complementary pickleball these two are starting to play. 10-3-1. Game point, four. And on that last two points ago with the Ernie, even the reaction of Ben, he just kind of shakes his head like, yep, that's my guy right there. I set him up. He knows what to do. Saw a lot of that yesterday. Fetty shut down the line. So, five game point saves here. Deficit though is seven. Ben. Oh, no way. Just lets out a big smile as he had bad intentions after a gorgeous topspin lob out of the air at him. And the murmurs in the crowd tell the story there. 4-10-1. A nice play on that last ball wing that Gabe is going to fade to his right. So, he plays the ball through the middle. Didn't try to force it to the right side of Gabe's body. Football. Second serve. I think you have to challenge this even though the calls on foot faults are almost never wrong. But it's 7-10 and it's a do-over. I have to review the referee's fault call stands. It was a fault. It's a loss of challenge. No free challenge remaining. One free challenge remaining. Resume play at 6-10-2. Or do that. That third. 7-10-2. I'll wait for it to get to you. Shot out. Johnson better be ready for that. Yeah, that was a nasty tee serve. They're going to play him in the final of singles tomorrow. 10-7-1. The tape in the sixth one doesn't work. Will it be lucky number seven? 10-7-2. What a hand. And this game rolls on. 4-10-1. More hand to backhand. That's a thing of beauty. And they kept going at him. Ben buries the last one like it was going to testify against him. 7-10-2. I mean, full tardioness on display right there. All the way across. Yes. Next ball fires line and then through the middle. He got all three locations in a matter of seconds. Game point eight. 10-7-1. And that is the one that gets it done. It could be from the dink cleanliness of his opponents or him playing a bit passively. There's a tee roped through the middle from Diascu, and they will start back with the ball. Players are requesting the brightness. And as we approach sunset, we always approach brightness on the video boards. Second serve. Does that count? I wouldn't say that's a traditional. No, definitely. He's looking for it, and I'm okay with it. Here's involved in the third. That was just a mess. Second years from Andre. Then he follows it up with a speed up. A couple. 0-0-1. That was as ugly a possession as you can have. They were using that to their advantage in some of the early rounds, and now we're seeing it later in the tournament, too. Second serve. I don't even think that that qualifies as a speed up. That's just a put away. No, that's a gift. 1-0-2. Poor dink. That's what you do with a poor dink. You finish the point. Additionally, a fade away from Gabe Tardio. He didn't even go middle or straight ahead. He went cross court with it. 0-1-1. Second serve. Tried to throw in the breaks, but just wasn't in a good position to handle the fit. 0-1-2. Was in a great spot and then just ripped past him. This table's going to turn real quick on Andre. How about that coverage? Much more of like a mixed doubles take there. Blur start. Man, through the middle, no forehand home. He had to go there with the back of the paddle, and it is 3-0. I mean, I like an aggressive Andre, but he has really been speeding the ball up at a high frequency. Of course, as I mentioned, not much from Fed. Let's see if we can get closer to the balanced offensive play from those two. He did not. What a shot from Ben Johns. He saw the deep ATP and just knew what was coming and the perfect angle on the paddle, clean as day all the way cross court. That's special. I think Gabe thinks he made it. Yeah. Oh, my. The ball was in. The loss of a challenge. No free challenge remaining. One free challenge remaining. Resume play at side out 3-1-1. No, no, no. Oh, there's the alarm clock goes off. That's a nice point to have coming out of the timeout because Fed spoke some English to display his displeasure to Don and then switched over to Spanish, which I'm sure was very colorful. What a shot back cross body by Ben. And high, too. It needs to be. That's out of that strike zone from hips to shoulders from Andre. It's above that. Side out. Just the grounds and the crowd of them to serve there. What a group here in Cape Cora. Second serve. I mean, he's jammed in his hip, but he's able to get that and hook it. And he hit it with plenty of pace, too. That ball got to stack true quickly. What the best do. Feel like you have them and you don't. You don't. Two matches to come after this one, everybody, so stay tuned. Ben was worried about those video boards on the side. We talked about some of the bigger, wider courts. This is not one of them. Two of those pokey one-handed dinks now from Ben left high. Of course, other than that, played pretty much flawlessly so far in this game. Second serve. I mean, the thirds aren't good. They're just not. One, five, two. I mean, there's just no room. Side out. There's just no room. Quick, I like it, too, from stack true over to Andre. But, man, it's such a small margin for error to make that shot and not have it crushed by Gabe. That's part of it. You try to go for a bit too much when you know that the counterattacking of the opponents is so good. You try extra pace. You try to paint lines. You try a variety of things to get it done that are out of your comfort zone. Yikes. Big swing and miss there after the wild forehand. That's two uncharacteristic choices, but to your credit, you start pressing. That's a hard shot to make. I love what Gabe tried to do. You know he's running. You try and put it behind him. But wingspans are wingspans. Stacks were passed on a couple that were reasonable to attack. One specifically sticks in my mind. I think that's a game flow thing. Andre hasn't necessarily been cooking to this point, so I think that that's a risk that Fed has to take on a speed up. And somehow covered in stature, misses deep. So they're actually getting a prolonged towel timeout here, but they can't take a traditional one here because they don't have it. 9-1-2. Left side Fed here. Is that one rally or let's just try it? And I think it's going to be let's just try it. I mean Andre could say I won on the right last year. 2-2. All good. 2-9-1. Second serve. Gabe tying his shoe. There it is. Pretty slowly too. Not in a hurry at all. A couple just routine misses. One out of the air and one off the bounce on the backhand side. Of course hasn't been over there until this point in time. Tried to hook it, can't find it. And he had backup too because he turned his hip. So he had to get through a lot to get to, you know. Okay. Looking at the bright side, that's the ninth or the eighth game point they've saved. Another big part of the win at Worlds for Stacks Rude in that match against Ben and Gabe was the lob out of the air. That's the first one we've seen in this match. Second serve. 3-10-2. Wow, punch of the cosmos right there. Punch with the left, buddy. I know. 10-3-1. Right hand is valuable. Match point two. Second serve. Three. 10-3-2. That will do it. Fetty sends a souvenir into the crowd, but dominant 7-3 for Ben Johns and Gabe Tardio. Welcome back, everybody, to the Zimmer Biomet Cape Coral Open. The number one seeds roar into Sunday again, winning it 7-3. Ben, that was one flawless performance. The only thing I have to ask about on the somewhat negative side is it took you eight game points in game one to get it done. Are you aware of that? Are you thinking about it? What can you recommend to amateurs here in the audience when you kind of feel the weight of that get a little heavier with each one? Yeah, that's actually more than I thought it was. I know it was a little bit, but I didn't know it was actually eight. Yeah, I felt like we were playing loose that whole game and maybe just got a little lackadaisical because we had a good lead 10-3 and then a couple of loose errors for them to get a couple points back. But I felt like we were playing well, so I wasn't super worried about it. But I feel like for anybody that struggles with that, it's kind of just keep doing what got you to the game points, trust in what you've been doing so far in that game and keep doing it. It's going to work probability-wise eventually. The bulletproof Bolivian, Gabe Tardio, playing fantastic as usual. And the word on the street, Gabe, is that this is a special day for a lady in your life, and it might not be what people expect on Valentine's Day. Yeah, today's my mom's birthday. So happy birthday. You know, I just wanted to say I love you. I couldn't be here without you, any of you guys. As you can see, the whole row is filled with my family, so pretty grateful to have a great family. And, yeah, happy birthday, Mom. Well, I love that, Gabe. Tell us more. Who else came to support you, and do you feel extra support or extra pressure with a nice row of your family over there? Oh, man, I have a lot of family here today. I have my grandparents, you know, a couple aunts, you know, my whole family, which were six total. So it's definitely a lot of support here, so I'm pretty grateful. But, yeah, back to your question. It's definitely a lot of pressure. I think I play my worst when they're here, so it's tough. You know, I always want to perform for them, so it adds a little extra pressure. Well, if that's your worst, I'd hate to see what your best is with them. That was pretty darn good, guys. Good luck tomorrow. Best of five finals. We'll see who their opponent is a little later. Well done, boys. Thanks, guys.