UVa’s Ince a quick study

The first start of Garett Ince’s career came against Duke in front of 8,000 fans at Klockner Stadium on April 12.

“I was pretty nervous,” recalled Ince, Virginia’s freshman faceoff specialist, “but it’s one of those things where you have to get your feet wet.”

Ince won a surprising 15 of 27 faceoffs that day. Since then, the Oakville, Ontario native has honed his craft further. He’s a huge reason why Virginia is playing in today’s NCAA Tournament semifinals against Syracuse.

Ince, who has the second most faceoff wins in UVa freshman history, won five of his last six in helping UVa complete a comeback win over Maryland last weekend.

“If a single player had to be picked for our most improved player,” said Virginia coach Dom Starsia, “it might be Garett Ince.”

Ince will have his work cut against Syracuse. The Orange feature Danny Brennan, who is No. 1 in the country in faceoff percentage.

“I’ve just been trying to watch film on him and learn what he does and ways I can beat him,” Ince said. “There’s definitely a lot of pressure being a freshman and having people count on you, especially with their faceoff guy being so good, but that’s part of the game. I’m just going to try and remain as calm as possible and be as prepared as possible as well.”

Ince took over the full-time faceoff duties following Virginia’s loss to Maryland on March 29. In that contest, sophomore Brian McDermott went down with an injury.

Ince, 20, says it has taken a while to adjust to taking faceoffs at the college level.

“In college, the guys are trying to jump the whistle a lot more,” he said, “and there’s also the fact I’m not facing off against someone who’s 17 or 18, but someone who’s 22. There’s a big strength difference there.”

Initially, Starsia was reluctant to throw a freshman into such a key role. However, when McDermott went down, Starsia said he really had no choice.

What made Starsia feel like Ince could do a good job was his size. Ince is listed at 6-foot-1, 217 pounds.

“He’s a big, strong kid,” Starsia said. “He’s not built like a normal freshman, so you knew he could take the pounding.”

Starsia has used defensemen Mike Timms and Ken Clausen, two of the biggest players on the team, to help Ince out when he doesn’t win the faceoff clean and it turns into a scrum.

“He’s going to need the wing guys to help him out a lot,” said Virginia senior Ben Rubeor, “and we’ve done a lot of work on that. I think it will be a challenge for everybody on the field.”

Against an up-tempo team like Syracuse, faceoffs could prove vital. The last thing Virginia wants to do is try and play catch-up like it had to do against Maryland.

Starsia is cautiously optimistic about the Ince-Brennan matchup.

“He’s getting better,” Starsia said. “I don’t know if he’ll be better enough for this challenge, but he’s getting better and I think he’s had a lot to do with our late-season success.”