Chase Budinger, Miles Evans, and an American underdog story

HERMOSA BEACH, California — Chase Budinger and Miles Evans have embraced their story.

They’re underdogs of a distinctly American variety: confident enough in themselves to seek an Olympic bid despite the vast majority of the beach volleyball world saying it wasn’t going to happen — and then, despite what may have appeared to be a classic case of delusional American overconfidence, making it happen.

Knew it the moment they agreed to partner with one another throughout this Paris Olympic quad. Knew it when the first event of the Olympic qualifying period was met with stiff resistance, a 17-21, 13-21 thwacking in the second round of the Itapema Challenge qualifier to Taylor Crabb and Taylor Sander, the team whom many expected to claim one of the two American berths into Paris.

Most beach volleyball fans agreed. When a poll was put out at the beginning of the qualifying period, asking who the two USA teams would be, Budinger and Evans — listed as “other” — received just one percent of the vote.

“We’re the underdogs,” Budinger said on SANDCAST: Beach Volleyball with Tri Bourne and Travis Mewhirter. “We were perceived as the fifth American team to start the season.”

He likes that role, Budinger. He enjoyed coming from behind, surpassing first Bourne and Chaim Schalk, then Trevor Crabb and Theo Brunner, shocking most anybody outside of their own team.

It’s possible they even shocked themselves. In their first 10 events of 2023, they posted just three finishes they would use in their Olympic ranking: a silver medal at the Saqaurema Challenge, ninth at the Montreal Elite16, and a 17th at the World Championships, an event they were able to compete in because Gambia couldn’t attain a visa into Mexico. Ninths or below in Challenges and qualifier exits in Elite16s, results they collected seven times in those first 10 tournaments, wouldn’t put them anywhere near Paris. Budinger, who is as sharp as he is explosive, knew as much.

He had chatted with Brunner at the beginning of the qualifying period, determining “what the baseline would be for points,” Budinger said. “Is it a fifth in a Challenge or ninth in an Elite? That was always in my head, trying to figure out what the bare minimum of points needed to be. Let’s get a minimum of 600 points for 12 events, that is our goal for this two year period.

“The first year we were struggling,…