The nerves were uninviting. As Chris Daddio prepared before every game, he simply kept to himself, trying not to think about the magnitude of the game he was about to play in.

The tension felt new to Daddio as a freshman last season. The midfielder from Purcellville, Va., had never played in the Carrier Dome. The college game amplified the stakes and increased the speed of the moment whenever Daddio, a faceoff specialist, entered the faceoff X.

‘I didn’t really say much to anyone,’ Daddio said. ‘I just kind of sat there with my head down in my locker, and I just put my headphones on and just tried to focus.’

Daddio’s nerves and inexperience showed at times on the field. And he wasn’t alone. Syracuse’s inability to win faceoffs last season proved to be one of its downfalls. The Orange won just 48.3 percent of faceoffs and was completely dominated by Maryland faceoff specialist Curtis Holmes in SU’s NCAA tournament quarterfinals loss. Winning just 3-of-14 faceoffs in that 6-5 overtime loss May 22 allowed the Terrapins to control play.

Whenever the Orange struggled to get going last year, it was often due to faceoffs. Daddio had the best percentage of winning faceoffs for SU, at 50 percent. Jeremy Thompson (49.6 percent) took the most faceoffs, but he graduated and left a pair of sophomores — Daddio and Ricky Buhr — to lead the way. Buhr won 48.6 percent of faceoffs last year, but he and Daddio combined to go just 3-of-9 in the NCAA quarterfinal loss.

Since last season’s shocking end, faceoffs have been a point of emphasis for Syracuse.

‘Faceoffs are important, especially the way teams play us,’ assistant coach Kevin Donahue said. ‘Everyone wants to stall the ball, so it’s really important that everything we do in practice, anywhere we can get a possession or not lose one becomes critical, and faceoffs are obviously a place where we can do both.’

For Daddio and Buhr, most of the struggles come with what Syracuse calls ‘phase two,’ which is when the faceoff specialist has to get the ball out and get possession. Donahue said the two are both very strong clampers, but their weakness is working on getting the ball where they want it to be and picking it up.

There’s been an increased effort this season to improve phase two. Buhr said the faceoff specialists go off to the side in practice to work on techniques more this season than last season.

Instead of training 15-20 minutes while the rest of the team did line drills, Daddio and Buhr are working and getting repetitions on the side while Syracuse is working on many offensive-based drills.

‘It really showed that it hurt us a little bit (last year) where we should have been focusing more on facing off than focusing on playing offense and running in on defense and stuff,’ Buhr said.

Donahue said a combination of things will lead to improvement. Increased repetitions are important. The more the faceoff specialists — who also include sophomore Drew Jenkins and freshman Mike Messina — work on their technique, the more their muscle memory will kick in. Some of it is confidence as well.

With a year under their belts, Daddio’s and Buhr’s confidences have been raised from experience. They’ve seen the best faceoff specialists in the country and now know what they need to improve on.

‘I’ve got to be more explosive than I was last year,’ Buhr said, ‘because the game’s a lot quicker than it was in high school, where I used to pop it out right to myself and I’d have plenty of time.

‘Now it’s the college level, you get the ball out and they’re already right there, and they’re hacking right on your arms, so I got to be more explosive.’

Buhr honed his explosiveness in the offseason by playing in a summer league with current and former college players. He was invited by his close friend Paul Carcaterra, a former Syracuse All-American midfielder.

Carcaterra told Buhr what he needed to work on and asked him to play on his summer league team in Westchester County. So every Thursday night, Buhr did, and he improved by going up against top competition.

Buhr said he faced off against players from Virginia, Loyola (Md.) and Cornell, some of whom he had been facing off against since he was younger. But the overall experience taught him what he needed to do to help the Orange have more success in faceoffs.

‘I felt like last year I got the clamp the majority of the time, but it was the phase two that really hurt me when I started to rake it out,’ Buhr said. ‘… But this year I feel more confident putting it between my legs and getting the ball and getting possession.’

Back at Syracuse, the team has gotten a boost from another former SU player. Tim Harder, a former defender who played on last season’s team, works as an assistant with the defense and faceoff specialists.

Having Harder on the field in practice has been beneficial to SU’s faceoff game.

‘Huge bonus right away,’ Donahue said. ‘Tim gives me another eye, he has a different style.’

The results of the extra attention in practice and an offseason of work and maturation between Daddio and Buhr’s freshman and sophomore years have yet to take shape on the field. Syracuse’s effort in the faceoff X was futile in many games — 7-of-27 against Duke, 12-of-28 against St. John’s, the disappointing effort against Maryland — and the most experienced member of that group is gone.

Donahue would not say there’s a definitive single faceoff specialist for this team. Whoever is winning the faceoffs the most will get the opportunity. And he said he would try a lot of different people.

Buhr said he thinks he and Daddio will be the primary guys, although in certain situations players like Jenkins will get shots.

Daddio’s excited to get on the field for his sophomore year, if only to have a chance to take the turf without the nerves of an inexperienced freshman.

‘I feel like (my confidence) has grown a lot going from last year, where I was nervous before every game,’ Daddio said. ‘And finally getting those under my toes and then just coming into the fall knowing what we were getting into, unlike last year.

‘Having that under my belt definitely helps out a lot. I’m definitely a lot more confident.’

mcooperj@syr.edu 

Published on February 15, 2012 at 12:00 pm

Contact Mark: mcooperj@syr.edu | @mark_cooperjr