It doesn’t get better than Monday for USA beach volleyball fans. Chase Budinger and Miles Evans, coming into these Paris Olympic Games as the second-ranked American team and a coin flip to break pool, debuted with a dominant win (more on that below) over France in front of a 12,000-strong home crowd. Five hours later, Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth delivered another sweep, this one over Australia’s Mariafe Artacho and Taliqua Clancy (more on that below). USA teams are now 4-1 on the beach.
Chase Budinger, Miles Evans sweep France in dominant fashion
It was worth wondering how Chase Budinger and Miles Evans would respond to it all. The media attention, the most Budinger has ever received in his now very well-documented multi-sport career. The love from LeBron James and Kevin Durant and the rest of Budinger’s peers from his former life as an NBA player. The matchup against the home team, France’s Arnaud Gauthier-Rat and Youssef Krou, in front of 12,000 French fans, in their Olympic debut, the biggest stage in the sport.
It didn’t take long to find out.
Budinger and Evans jumped out to an 8-3 lead in the first and then doubled that margin to 17-7. By the time France showed any signs of life, the first set was out of hand, and even the 21-14 score in which it finished belied how thoroughly dominant the Americans were. The second set was much the same, Budinger and Evans leaving Krou in a futile search for answers — answers he would never find in an eventual 21-11 loss.
Krou’s patented hard angle swing was mostly unavailable, perhaps due to the deep sand at Eiffel Tower Stadium, perhaps due to the lingering effects of an injury that has had him out since they forfeited at the Ostrava Elite16 in early June, perhaps due to Budinger and Evans simply adjusting their defensive strategy against a team that had beaten them in three straight matches coming into Paris.
Or maybe, as it often goes in sports, it was due to those myriad factors mixing for the perfect American cocktail, a 21-14, 21-11 dusting of France’s top team.
“I really tried to use my basketball experience of playing in front of big crowds to be composed the whole time. But it definitely was not like that inside,” Budinger admitted.
“Even on the bus ride over here I was telling Miles about my first basketball game, of how nervous I was and how the nerves really got to me, how it speeds you up, the game just feels ultimately faster than you are used to.
“I was trying to explain how we are going to breathe and how we are going to look at each other, use each other to slow the game down, calm ourselves, calm the nerves as much as possible.”
Suffice it to say, Budinger and Evans responded to all of the glitz and glamour and pomp and circumstances of these Olympic Games just fine.
“It’s one of the best starts we could imagine,” Evans said. “I had all these bad scenarios in my head going into this match. I am super thankful we were able to overcome that.”
Their win makes it three straight for USA beach teams, following sweeps from Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth over Canada’s Sophie Bukovec and Heather Bansley, and Kelly Cheng and Sara Hughes over the Czech Republic’s Barbora Hermannova and Marie-Sara Stochlova, all of whom are now 1-0. Only Miles Partain and Andy Benesh have dropped a match, to Cuba’s Jorge Alayo and Noslen Diaz in the opening match of these Olympic Games.
Budinger and Evans’ next match will be on Tuesday, against the Netherlands’ Stefan Boermans and Yorick de Groot, the top seed in Pool F who swept Spain’s Adrian Gavira and Pablo Herrera earlier on Monday.
Qatar stuns Sweden for biggest upset of the Paris Olympic Games
It was only a matter of time before a stunner took place at the base of Eiffel Tower Stadium.
It took just three days.
Qatar’s Cherif Younousse and Ahmed Tijan, bronze medalists of the Tokyo Olympic Games, came back from a 15-21 opening set to rally for a 21-19, 20-18 shocker over the top seed of the Paris Games. The win stops an 18-match win streak for Sweden, and snapped a three-match losing streak for Qatar against the Swedes.
True to form, however, the match went the full three sets, as all six have gone between Qatar and Sweden, two of the best defensive teams in the world. The upset has made a full mess of Pool A, as Qatar, the three seed, is now in the driver’s seat with just one match remaining, against Australia’s Mark Nicolaidis and Izac Carracher, who are 0-2. Sweden will play Italy’s Paolo Nicolai and Sam Cottafava, who are 1-1 thus far, with a loss to Qatar and a win over Australia, both sweeps.
Kristen Nuss, Taryn Kloth notch sweep over Australia
It was only two years ago when Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth played Australia’s Taliqua Clancy and Mariafe Artacho for the first time.
It was a lifetime ago.
In May of 2022, Nuss and Kloth were still a relative unknown to the beach volleyball world, a pair of rookies coming not from Southern California but… Louisiana? A 5-foot-6 defender thought to be the next potential face of USA Volleyball? Partnered with a blocker from South Dakota? On paper, none of it made sense, and, on paper, little of it still does.
Yet there were Nuss and Kloth, emerging from the qualifier to advance all the way to the finals of the Kusadasi Challenge, matched up with the silver medalists from the Tokyo Olympics. It was considered an upset at the time, when Nuss and Kloth shocked the third-seeded Australians, 17-15 in the third set.
Two years later, at the Paris Olympic Games, the only shocking thing would be if Australia beat Nuss and Kloth.
That’s how far Nuss and Kloth have come since that final in Turkey, where they logged the first major win of their international careers. And on Monday evening in Paris, there was no shock, no upset, just another machinelike victory for Nuss and Kloth, a 21-16, 21-16 win that was as smooth as the score indicates.
The win is the second straight of these Games for Nuss and Kloth, following a sweep over Canada’s Sophie Bukovec and Heather Bansley. Now 2-0 in pool play, Nuss and Kloth are guaranteed to break pool, and, given their set and point differential, are almost guaranteed one of the top two spots and a berth into the round of 16. They will play China’s Xinyi Xia and Chen Xue, who are 1-1 after a loss to Australia and a win over Canada, on August 1.
Monday’s Olympic Beach Volleyball Results
Sam Cottafava, Paolo Nicolai (Italy) def. Mark Nicolaidis, Izac Carracher (Australia) 21-19, 21-19
Stefan Boermans, Yorick de Groot (Netherlands) def. Pablo Herrera, Adrian Gavira (Spain) 21-15, 21-15
Chen Xue, Xinyi Xia (China) def. Sophie Bukovec, Heather Bansley (Canada) 21-15, 21-19
Nina Brunner, Tanja Huberli (Switzerland) def. Daniela Alvarez, Tania Moreno (Spain) 21-12, 21-19
Melissa Humana-Paredes, Brandie Wilkerson (Canada) def. Poletti, Michelle (Paraguay) 21-16, 21-12
Chase Budinger, Miles Evans (USA) defe.Arnaud Gauthier-Rat, Youssef Krou (France) 21-14, 21-11
Esmee Bobner, Zoe Verge-Depre (Switzerland) def. Tina Graudina, Anastasija Samoilova (Latvia) 21-15, 21-14
Cherif Younousse, Ahmed Tijan (Qatar) def. David Ahman, Jonatan Hellvig (Sweden) 15-21, 21-19, 20-18
Lezana Placette, Alexia Richard (France) def. Laura Ludwig, Louisa Lippmann (Germany) 21-14, 22-20
Kristen Nuss, Taryn Kloth (USA) def. Mariafe Artacho, Taliqua Clancy (Australia) 21-16, 21-16
