So how does a roller hockey player from Virginia wind up in Colorado as an important member of one of the country’s better ice hockey teams?

“I started playing roller, that was fun, and started traveling with that. A lot of my friends played ice hockey; there was only one team around at the time, so I played for that,” Air Force forward Matt Fairchild said.

“Then there was Double-A, then juniors and I talked to coach and … here I am.”

Fairchild, a junior honor student majoring in systems engineering management, is way too polite to answer the question with the standard “practice, practice, practice.” But you couldn’t blame him if he did, because his hockey persona is all about quick.

Scary quick. And a lot of hard work.

“He has outstanding speed. Some people at times question his hockey sense. His hockey sense is fine,” said Falcons coach Frank Serratore. “It’s just hard when you skate as fast as he is for your brain and your hands to keep up with your feet.

“When he’s in the groove on a given night, he’s virtually unstoppable.”

He was like that against Army in two victories after a three-game losing streak and 1-4-1 stretch coming out of the holiday break.

He scored short-handed in the opening game of the weekend and added a second goal and assist in a 5-1 victory. The next night, he assisted on linemate Derrick Burnett’s goal that came 8 seconds after Army had taken a 1-0 lead. That might have been the turning point in the Falcons’ 3-2 victory.

He scored an even bigger goal in Friday night’s 4-4 overtime tie at Mercyhurst, redirecting a Jeff Hajner shot for the tying goal, with an extra attacker on the ice, with 55 seconds left in regulation.

Mercyhurst kept him off the board Saturday (a 3-2 overtime loss), only the third time in the last 11 games Fairchild hasn’t recorded a point.

Fairchild is having a solid season, with 10 goals and 14 assists in 26 games (through Friday), fifth on the team in scoring. But when you factor what he brings to the academy off the ice, the answer to the original question is emphatic.

“Matt Fairchild is one of the top student-athletes that I’ve ever had the privilege of coaching,” Serratore said. “This young man has no flaws. He possesses great character, he is a great student and he is a great hockey player.”

Fairchild started out by playing roller hockey for clubs based out of the Washington suburb of Ashburn, Va. He didn’t even start ice skating until he was of squirt age, 9-10 years old. And he admits that, growing up, he was a far better roller hockey player.

“We won a lot of tournaments,” he said.

He played for several local ice hockey clubs, and his high school team, and – aided by his academic talents – eventually got an invitation to play for the Walpole Stars of the Eastern Junior Hockey League.

Two years later, he attracted the attention of the Air Force staff. He was encouraged to visit.

“I came out and just loved it out here,” Fairchild said. “Before that, I’d never even thought about it at all.”

But he didn’t enter the academy for another year.

“We liked his skating and skill, but he needed to get stronger,” Serratore said. “That extra year in junior enabled him to come in and play an impact role for us right away as a freshman.”

Fairchild agreed the extra year was good for him. “That was a good thing for here,” he said. “I had a lot of free time; now I have none.”

He was second among freshman scorers with five goals and six assists in 39 games. Last season, he was fourth on the team with 29 points (11 goals, 18 assists) in 39 games, highlighted by his first college hat trick against then-No. 4 Denver.

Speed is his calling card, and he has to be fast, because he’s not big (5-foot-10, 175 pounds). But he has made a name for himself as a penalty killer.

Killing penalties is, to put it in military terms, tough duty. But Fairchild has scored four short-handed goals this season, second in the nation, after notching three as a sophomore.

“I get lucky. I get a lot of chances on the penalty kill,” he said. “Probably half my shots are on the penalty kill. I don’t think people expect it for somebody to come behind them and give them a stick or two.”

Perhaps like the folks who don’t expect a roller hockey player from Virginia to be in that position in the first place.

Fleet-footed Air Force junior Matt Fairchild is second in the nation with four short-handed goals this season. Photo by KEVIN KRECK, THE GAZETTE