Golf Croquet · Alabama
Birmingham Croquet Club
Growing the game of croquet across Alabama — and building Birmingham a home court of its own.
Our mission
We're growing croquet across Alabama.
Birmingham Croquet Club started in the Magic City, and we're not stopping there. The goal is simple and stubborn: more lawns, more players, more clubs — a real croquet culture in Alabama, open to anyone who wants to pick up a mallet.
About the club
Your local hub for the game.
We play golf croquet — the fast, social, six-hoop version that's easy to learn and hard to put down. The club is young and building: we're recruiting our founding roster right now, and the door could not be more open.
Everyone's welcome, whatever your experience. Come to watch, come to learn, come to compete. There's a mallet here for you, and a friendly game waiting.
How we got here
From a park, to a private lawn, to a city.
The Crestline Park Lawn Sports Society
It began as a group of guys in a public park. A cheap backyard croquet set, some beer, and a competitive streak none of them expected to take so seriously. No club, no dues, no lawn of their own — just whoever turned up at Crestline Park.
It grew past twenty regulars. Somewhere along the way the department-store hoops were quietly retired and replaced with tournament gear.
The Mountain Brook Croquet Club
Arthur P. Bagby III — president of Bagby Elevator Co. and the Alabama director of the U.S. Croquet Association — had spent years building a championship lawn on the edge of Shades Mountain. The slope took more than 3,000 truckloads of fill, a private road for the heavy equipment, and layers of gravel, drainage and sand before a single blade of Bermuda went down. An underground sprinkler system. Custom mallets. A wicket installer fashioned out of elevator parts. Something close to half a million dollars, and 105 by 84 feet of very good grass.
He heard about the group playing in the park and invited them up. The Society traded park turf for a tournament lawn, and became the Mountain Brook Croquet Club.
The Birmingham Croquet Club
Same club, expanded. The name changed because the ambition did — not one lawn for the people who happen to know about it, but croquet across Alabama, and a public court in Birmingham that anyone can walk onto and play.
Which puts us back where the whole thing started: in a park, open to whoever shows up.
The Birmingham project
A public court, right here in the Magic City.
Most croquet in America is played behind country-club gates. We want something different: a public croquet court in Birmingham, where anyone can walk on and play. It's the reason the club exists — and every new member, every match, every lesson gets us a little closer.
Help us build it →
New to the game?
Getting started is easy.
Say hello
Send us a message on Facebook. No experience, no equipment, and no pressure — just a hello gets it going.
Learn the shots
We'll teach you the game — running a hoop, clearing an opponent, and the quiet tactics that decide a match.
Play a real game
Golf croquet clicks fast. You won't spend weeks practicing alone — you'll be in a genuine game the same day.
Gear
The mallet directory.
Ready for a mallet of your own? These are the makers — tournament specialists and custom craftsmen from Florida to New Zealand. New to it? Ask any member before you buy; we're glad to point you the right way.
The regional scene
Croquet across the Deep South.
Alabama isn't alone. Here are the clubs across our corner of the map — worth a visit, a match, or a weekend road trip.
Alabama
- Birmingham Croquet ClubUsBirmingham
- Eufaula Country ClubEufaula
- Steelwood Croquet AssociationLoxley
- The Lakewood ClubPoint Clear
Georgia
- Peachtree Hills Place Croquet ClubAtlanta
- Jekyll Island Croquet ClubJekyll Island
- The Landings Golf & Athletic ClubSavannah
- Sky Valley ClubSky Valley
- LenbrookAtlanta
- Carroll County Croquet PlayersCarrollton
Mississippi
- The Country Club of JacksonJackson
- Mississippi State Croquet ClubGautier
- Highlands Mallet ClubJackson
- Pocahontas Mallet ClubPocahontas
Alabama, Georgia & Mississippi clubs per the USCA directory. Know one we've missed? Tell us and we'll add it to the map.
Tournaments
We take the game on the road.
Birmingham plays the circuit — club opens around the Deep South, regional championships, and the national tournaments. The marquee trip comes every spring: the Grand Cup, played on the championship lawns of The Lakewood Club at the Grand Hotel in Point Clear — down near Fairhope on Mobile Bay — drawing top croquet players from across the country. It's the club's favorite weekend of the year: first-class lawns, top-notch staff, and a field that feels more like a family reunion than a competition.
Our 2025 Grand Cup crew — Todd Russell, Charles Wimberley, John Somerset & Tom Howell. Wherever there's a lawn and a bracket, Birmingham shows up.
Play with us →
From the lawn
Days worth telling you about.
Pop-up croquet comes to Cross Creek.
On a Saturday afternoon in late August, Mary McSpadden invited her neighbors out to the lawn at Cross Creek, and the club brought the game to them: a full-size court, hoops, mallets and balls, set up where a yard had been that morning.
A crowd of fifty-plus turned out in their summer whites, first-timers and old hands alike. Mountain Brook Mayor Graham Smith came out for it too. Lessons turned into matches, matches filled the afternoon, and by the end of it there was already talk of a Cross Creek Croquet Club.
It was the first outing for the club’s pop-up program: we bring everything, we set up, we teach, we host. Next stop, Lake Martin in September.
Want the court on your lawn? Send us a message ↗
The 2025 Golf Croquet Open.
The last weekend of July, on the club’s home lawn: players from across the Southeast, and matches that kept going under the lights when the daylight gave out.
Matthew Jackson took the championship, besting Henry Smith of Bunbury, Australia — club pro at the Country Club of Mobile — in the final.
Plaques went home for champion, runner-up and plate champion — and the local press took notice.
Bham Now covered the weekend — read their story ↗
An afternoon of croquet with Miss Terry.
Every spring the Nick’s Kids Foundation holds its annual fundraiser in Birmingham. While Coach Saban’s tournament plays out on the golf course, Terry Saban gathers her own group for lunch at the Hot & Hot Fish Club — and in 2025, the afternoon that followed belonged to croquet.
Eddie Greenhalgh and Todd Russell led the instruction at Shook Hill, back when the club was still playing under the Mountain Brook name. Most of the group had never held a mallet. By the end of it they were running hoops and discovering what everyone eventually discovers about golf croquet: it is a great deal more competitive than it looks.
Since it began, Nick’s Kids has raised more than $15 million for education across Alabama.
The day was written up by Christiana Roussel — read her account ↗
Standings
The Clubhouse Index
A live club ladder, built from our own tournament results — the gcrankings idea, made ours.
The founding roster. Grades and records go up as club tournament play gets recorded.
Join us
Come play with us.
Whether you've played for years or have never held a mallet, there's a place for you here — and a game to help grow across Alabama. Send us a message and we'll take it from there.
