How To Score In Pickleball And Never Lose Track Again!

Even though Pickleball seems to have a lower learning curve when learning the basics and understanding its intricacies, the scoring system on the other hand is a completely different beast.

In fact, I have to be honest here, being a Pickleball enthusiast who has been playing this sport on a regular basis for at least half a decade, struggled to keep track of this sport scoring system until I came up with an efficient methodology to keep track of my scoring pattern which I will be sharing down below.

Keep in mind that it’s a thorough guide on How To Score In Pickleball And Never Lose Track Again, so make sure you do skim through the “Good stuff” as some of these technical terms might sound boring or trivial but trust me it will save you quite a lot of headache.

Because trust me once you get a hang of it, you will fall in love with this sport once again.

Fundamentals Of Pickleball

The first and foremost thing you need to do is understand and acknowledge the ins and outs of this sport and that is only possible once you learn the rules of the scoring system.

The length of the game can be decided at the start of a session and ranges from 11,15 or 21, depending on the type of tournament or league you are engaging in.
A Serve has to be executed diagonally across the net towards the other player of the opposing team.
Each side has to take turns when serving, in each member of the team has to be switched between opposing teams after each serve.
A serve is only won once a team loses rallying, otherwise, the original server has to remain servicing the ball.
A server has to switch sides after a point is scored.
The game is concluded once a team wins with a lead of 2 extra points from the assigned maximum score points i.e. 11,15,21.

Scoring & Tracking In Pickleball

Now that you have a general understanding of how pickleball works, let’s dive down into its scoring system and how it is categorized.

In Pickleball, the person standing on the right side has to serve and only the serve can score points. The sides are changed after a server scores.
The score has to be called out before hitting the ball, otherwise, it will result in a fault. The scoring system is subjective and depends on the perspective it is called out.
Just for your understanding and to make things simpler, I will be naming the first team, Team A, and the second team, Team B.
Let’s assume Team A has scored 5 points while the opposing team, Team B has scored 2 Points, so if Team B is serving, the total Score will be called out as 2–5–1.
Notice, how I used a third figure, the Third number determines the number of the server, and each player is assigned a number respectively, 1 or 2.
The server is called an even player since they start from the right side.
On the other hand, if Team A decides to serve as their second player, the score will be 5–2–2.
Notice how the perspective of the score changes? That’s right, the score depends on the side of the server that is calling, i.e. Team A or Team B.

There is no doubt that understanding a scoring system and tracking it is a bit complicated, which is why I have color-coded it so you can learn and understand and create a muscle memory at a subconscious level.

Bottom Line

The key to learning and understanding “How To Score In Pickleball And Never Lose Track Again” all depends on how much time you spend practicing on the court because otherwise, you would lose interest after a couple of sessions because the pickleball scoring system itself can get confusing for everyone standing in the court.

It is also quite frowned upon that a person playing a game cannot keep track of their score since it shows a lack of etiquette and professionalism especially if you are striving for the bigger leagues.

I hope this article was beyond helpful, feel free to bookmark it so you can visit it again anytime in case you forget about the scoring system.