15-year-old Aniket Dixit is a bowler and vice captain for the NY Ovals Cubs, a youth cricket team. He came straight from taking the PSAT to cricket practice, and is a dedicated player.
“It's like the love of my life. I love playing it. Play it almost every day. At home, I practice so with I don't know, I don't feel happy without playing it every day.”
Dixit is not the only young player invested in the game, as youth and adult cricket leagues are growing across the U.S. Cricket is played and watched by more than 1 billion people around the world. Although it is the second-most watched sport in the world behind soccer, cricket has yet to break through in the United States. But it’s getting closer: the U.S. has hosted cricket games in two world cup tournaments in 2023 and 2024. Team USA qualified for the 2024 World Cup, and even earned a surprising win in its debut against Pakistan. And when the Summer Olympics come to Los Angeles in 2028, cricket will be included for the first time since 1900.
Ashok Adikoppula is a co-founder of the Capital District Cricket Association, which formed in 2015 to grow cricket professionally in the Capital Region. He is also a coach for the Cubs. He says the road has been long, but the sport is breaking boundaries in the U.S.
“Back in the ’90s, we only had one team that used to go travel to New York City, all the way up to 2015, until the CDCA started. We used to travel to New York City, Connecticut to play the games. But now from that one team, now we're talking about 30 plus teams.”
The NY Ovals facility opened in 2023, and had its biggest season yet in 2025, hosting games in the under-19 Men’s and Women’s Championships. The Schenectady County Legislature contributed $975,000 to build the facility, which hosted more than 200 teams in the minor leagues this summer, according to Adikoppula.
Matt Stabler is also a coach for the NY Ovals Cubs and says building the facility has been pivotal for cricket in the Capital Region.
“I remember when we first came over here with my daughter, about three or four years ago, and this place has changed so much in such a short space of time. Ashok and his team have done an amazing job of creating this cricketing paradise that I love, coming to each week, coaching the kids, watching the minor league players. It's an incredible facility, and we're really blessed to have this in the capital region.”
16-year-old Cubs Captain Ananda Krishna Bodduluri also says the facility and organized leagues have allowed him to play regularly, making cricket accessible.
“It actually is very exciting, like, more opportunities for the little ones here. I just love to see it growing. Hopefully it gets big here as well.”
The Empire State Cricket League, founded in 2023, is another local cricket league that has seen rapid growth, according to co-founder Amit Shah. He says that the major goals of the Empire State Cricket League are transparency and inclusivity, and to set the groundwork for players to go on to the national level. Shah wants cricket to be a sport that is included in schools in particular.
“Cricket has a lot of potential, but it will not be mainstream until it is recognized at the school level.” He also noted that cricket has yet to reach the level of popularity and dedication it has in other countries. “Back in India and Pakistan that we are from cricket is religion, you know, we play this a lot, right? It's not the case in US. Unfortunately, it should be the case, because now we live here. But again, it has a long way to go.”
Developing the local cricket scene has also meant building up the women’s game -- the Empire State Cricket League hosts women’s cricket tournaments. Women’s team captain, Annapurna Uddaraju says that she was encouraged to start playing because of her husband, who is a dedicated player in different leagues in the area.
“He's in every form of cricket in Albany, he plays in every form as much as possible. He's out during summer weekends. So that's how I started building interest. Why not women play? So that's how he has encouraged me, actually, to just go forward for the women's cricket and just give it a try. That's how we started building our team.”
Still, Uddaraju says there is more work to be done to support women’s cricket locally, noting that there is not as consistent a season as there is for the men’s teams.
“What is happening right now is they just let us know a month or two months ahead, that there is a season for women's tournament this year, and it's just a short period of notice that we get usually. That is something we felt like probably having something beforehand would help us to at least do some practice.”
Despite the challenges of breaking into the mainstream for both men’s and women’s cricket, Adikoppula is particularly hopeful about the future of the sport, because of the young players he is coaching.
“This is it. This is the story, right? I mean, this is what you all anybody, any sports, any athlete, work for. So you play as a sportsman for several years. But you may or may not achieve what you want to achieve throughout your career, but if you can transfer that knowledge and build the next generation, that's exactly what anybody wants to do.”
