São Paulo, Brazil, September 26, 2014 - Josh Binstock and Sam Schachter moved directly into the second round of the FIVB World Tour São Paulo Grand Slam Thursday night as surprise winners of Pool G and complete an impressive treble for Canada.
Earlier in the day, Jamie Lynn Broder and Kristina Valjas in the women's draw and Ben Saxton and Chaim Schalk in the men's draw, had already guaranteed their places, and Binstock and Schachter completed the treble in emphatic style with a comfortable 2-0 (21-18, 21-10) over Turkey's Murat Giginoglu and Volkan Gogtepe.
While others might have been surprised though, Binstock was quietly confident that he and his younger team-mate Schachter could do some damage in São Paulo. "We know our capability," he said. "And we knew that nobody else kind of knew, so we knew we had it in us, but whether we could actaully do it was a different story."
A chiropractor when not on court, 33-year-old Binstock said the new pair, that started the season ranked fifth in Canada, actually took motivation from a poor result in the qualifying event at the last Grand Slam before the World Tour made its way to Brazil.
"We went to Poland (Stare Jablonki Grand Slam) and lost to a team (Liamin-Barsouk RUS) we shouldn't have lost to and that can either make or break your season, but we both knew that wasn't our best game."
In São Paulo, they started on Wednesday with a 2-1 (20-22, 21-18, 15-11) win over 10th seeds Doppler-Horst of Austria and followed that up with a big 2-0 (21-16, 21-18) win over 7th seeds Herrera-Gavira of Spain, before closing the deal against Turkey.
Binstock says his combination with 24-year-old Schachter has taken some work in terms of balancing the pair's playing styles with him having to adopt more of a blocker's role while Schachter takes care of the back court, but feels their skills blend well.
"I've been on the tour a few years," he said. "So I know the level and I know how good Sam is, I've actually never had a guy as talented as him, so if I can harness his energy I can 'just' be good and he can be the x-factor."
Looking ahead to the elimination rounds, Binstock is confident they have a reasonable chance against any of the pairs they might encounter even though their 'surprise' factor might have diminished after the pool win.
"We're playing with no pressure, nobody's expecting anything from us," he said, looking at the positive aspect of being a lower-ranked outsider.
While a minimum ninth-place finish is already a best result for the double, and others might not be expecting anything from them, you can be sure they'll still be expecting plenty from themselves when the São Paulo Grand Slam elimination rounds start.