The 2024 Virginia men’s lacrosse season went off with a bang on Saturday, as the Cavaliers dispatched the 11th-ranked Michigan Wolverines with ease, coming away with a dominant 19-11 victory. With one game in the books, let’s take a look at what we learned about Lars Tiffany’s Cavaliers in their first game of the season.
No Petey, no problem?
One of the biggest question marks facing Virginia in 2024 was the state of its faceoff unit, as for the first time since 2019, the Cavaliers started a season without Petey LaSalla, the program’s all-time leader in faceoff wins and ground balls. UVA did some quality work in the transfer portal, adding three faceoff specialists, but the strength and quality of the position group remained quite uncertain heading into the start of the season. Lars Tiffany had tempered his expectations for the unit in the opener, as Virginia faced Michigan’s Justin Wietfeldt, one of the best faceoff men in the country. Tiffany was blown away by the outcome of that facet of the game. Navy transfer Anthony Ghobriel went 15/23 and Colgate transfer Thomas Colucci went 6/8, giving Virginia’s dangerous offense a pivotal possession advantage as the Cavaliers won the faceoff battle 21-11 overall. It’s only one game, but the post-Petey LaSalla era of faceoffs at Virginia might just be okay.