Virginia Coach Lars Tiffany’s teams play a certain way. Run and gun. Blister out in transition. They might commit some turnovers, might throw away some passes, but it is going to work in the end, because they are simply going to overwhelm you with firepower.
That is the philosophy. It means that Tiffany’s Virginia program, after eight full seasons, has more commonly scored in the 20s than in single digits. The Cavaliers have ranked inside the nation’s top 11 in scoring offense in all but one of those eight seasons. They never scored less than seven times in one game.
But Saturday, in a full game against an unranked opponent, they scored five goals.
Ohio State, now ranked No. 16, clobbered then-No. 12 Virginia, 14-5. It marked already the season’s second stunning upset loss. The first came a week before with then-No. 4 Virginia’s 13-10 home defeat to then-No. 20 Richmond.
“We’ve really got to look ourselves in the mirror,” Tiffany said in his media availability, “and say, ‘Hey fellas, we gotta step this up. We’ve got to play at a higher level.’”
Virginia is now 2-2 and ranked No. 18, the losses alternating with home blowouts of Colgate and High Point. The postseason, for a change, is a budding concern, lingering far in the distance. But the team’s focus is on right now.
Practices the last few days? They have come tinged with an extra edge.
“I’ll admit that probably we’ve gotten on each other a little bit more this week,” Tiffany said. “ ... It’s been, ‘Hey, let’s be a little instigative to each other.’”
The problems have ranged from stagnant offense to clearing issues to offsides gaffes to, most shockingly, weakness on ground balls. Perhaps the biggest thing is the sense of uncertainty.
The preseason featured so much competition, with the roster so deep across positions, that lineups remained up in the air. That is still the case. Tiffany is talking about “tinkering,” about finding the right combinations, the right lines.
What he thought would be established has shifted beneath him. Tiffany entered the season accepting that the faceoff spot would not be a strength. But Virginia’s faceoff men, after four games, have won the faceoff percentage every time. Senior Anthony Ghobriel and sophomore Andrew Greenspan are firing on all cylinders.
Virginia installed a new clearing scheme this season. The coaching staff had mulled it over for years, noticing how many other teams used it, and finally this offseason they pulled the trigger. It’s a work in progress — Virginia’s 79.8 percent on clears is 59th out of 74 Division I teams.
“There’s some growing pains with it,” Tiffany said. “And, oh my gosh, are those tough pains.”
Beyond all those things, there is one, more tangible uncertainty. It hatched in garbage time Saturday — with 37 seconds left to play, precisely — when star sophomore attackman McCabe Millon got slammed to the turf. He walked off supported on either side. Tiffany said Wednesday he had no update.
On top of the physical healing and the tinkering and the growing pains, there is, of course, the mental side.
Tiffany bandied no words after the Richmond game. One team, he said, showed up ready to play. It was the other one. He later said, after the High Point win, that the Richmond loss “will haunt me for a long time.”
The letdown manifested in one stat. Virginia is known for its ferocity on ground balls, its unrelenting tenacity. That is part of the way it plays — breakneck, aggressive, scooping up loose balls and blistering toward goal. It lost the ground ball battle against Richmond. It did so again against Ohio State.
“That’s the one that you really look in the mirror,” Tiffany said after the Richmond game. “Wait a minute. Our core principles, we weren’t able to follow through on.”
The play has not, of course, been all bad. Junior attackman Ryan Colsey has ripped off 14 goals in four games. The man-down defense, third worst in the nation last year, is fourth in the country so far. That faceoff unit is winning at a clip of 59 percent.
Virginia will need all of that, and improvements in other areas, for what awaits Saturday in Baltimore — No. 7 Johns Hopkins, for the Doyle Smith Cup, and something of a rubber match after a pair of intoxicating clashes last season. The Blue Jays are 4-1, with wins over No. 10 Georgetown and No. 17 Denver and a close loss to No. 4 North Carolina.
“It’s a familiar foe,” Tiffany said. “And I’ll give them credit, I think they have done a better job than we have to this point with adapting to new personnel.”
It is a game that, senior midfielder Noah Chizmar acknowledged, means more because of the bumpy start to the season. In past years, the game may have mattered because of the rivalry, because of the opportunity for a massive early win. Now it is a game that could turn things around. Because things need turning.
The morale, though, Chizmar affirmed, remains high. Tiffany said preseason that this is the most united team he has coached at Virginia, camaraderie brimming over. That helps in times like these.
The talent and morale, for Virginia, are clearly there. Maybe that is the worst part.
“We know how good we are,” Chizmar said. “I think that’s what’s the most frustrating thing about the first four games.”
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