Iconic Queen’s Beach

Birthplace of beach volleyball.

This week, Hawaii looks to match its ranking — No. 3 — with a third consecutive Big West championship when hosting the conference tournament for the first time. The Rainbow Wahine (32-3) put their school-record 27-match winning streak on their home sand, where they have won 11 matches and two tournament titles.

The SandBows are the top seeds and already are all but guaranteed a spot in next week’s NCAA championship tournament at Gulf Shores, Ala. But, with no automatic berth given to the event champion and the dark cloud hovering after the UH men’s volleyball team was not selected for the NCAA tournament, Hawaii has an extra bit of motivation.

“It’s a great lesson for us, to handle our business, win the Big West and leave no room for doubt,” said SandBows coach Jeff Hall, a UH men’s assistant from 2011-14. “Winning the Big West was the goal from the beginning of the year. Obviously, it’s our goal now.

“There are some great teams coming in. The scary thing is that (No. 4) Cal Poly and (No. 6) Long Beach State are on the bubble. They have a lot more to play for and that could be a great motivator for them. It’s something we’re prepared for. I’m not asking my kids to play any differently than they’ve played all year. We should be fine.”

The eight-team NCAA tournament field has three automatic bids for teams in the west region, three from the east, and two at-larges. In the AVCA coaches poll, the top six teams are from the west — UCLA, Pepperdine, Hawaii, Cal Poly, USC and Long Beach State. One of those will not be continuing its season next week.

“The hard reality is that we’ll be in the pairs tournament when it gets announced Sunday,” Hall said of the NCAA selection show. “For one of the programs who’ve had a great year, maybe their best year ever, they won’t make it. It’s too bad that Long Beach didn’t beat SC (a 3-2 loss on April 17). That would have rocked the landscape.

“But you never know. Maybe three Big West teams get in. It all depends on how this weekend goes with us and how the Pac-12 tournament goes.”

Three weeks ago in Folsom, Calif., Hawaii saw all five of these teams at the Big West Challenge, dropping just one point over the two days. That came against second-seeded Cal Poly at Flight 5 when Hannah Hubbard-Heather Pembroke held off Hannah Zalopany-Paige Dreeuws, 21-17, 16-21, 15-13 at Livermore Community Park.

Seeking to reverse that result with its first-ever win over the SandBows are the fourth-ranked Mustangs (25-5), who are 8-3 in their past 11 matches with losses to No. 1 UCLA, 4-1; No. 2 Pepperdine, 5-0; and No. 3 Hawaii, 4-1.

“These week is absolutely critical for us,” Cal Poly coach Todd Rogers said. “If we win the Big West, we are in (the NCAA tournament). Let’s nail down that coffin.

“I think that the Big West has a very good upper tier, the strongest at the top of any other conference. I don’t think Hawaii is a lock but they’d have to do pretty poor not to make it. If they were to finish third, then I’d think there’d be a real interesting conversation. But they are the front-runner.”

The tournament has an added competition day Sunday with the inaugural pairs tournament, a single-elimination format very similar to professional beach events. Hawaii has four of the 16 pairs and are in different quadrants of the bracket.

“For sure, we could see an all-SandBows final four,” said Amy Ozee, who has teamed with Ari Homayun at Flight 4 to win 21 straight.

Each school has two pairs entered with Hawaii, Cal Poly and Long Beach State given additional pair as a top-3 seed. As the event host, Hawaii has a fourth pair with Ka’iwi Schucht-Emily Maglio seeded first, Morgan Martin-Lea Monkhouse seeded third, Carly Kan-Laurel Weaver seeded seventh and Ozee-Homayun seeded 12th. Schucht-Maglio have won a school-record 23 straight.

“The pairs should be a lot of fun, the coaches have been pushing for it,” said Rogers, an All-American indoor player at UC Santa Barbara and gold medalist at the 2008 Beijing Games in beach with Phil Dalhausser. “They’ve seeded it fairly well. It’s going to be a fun little tournament that will be fast.

“There’s nothing riding on it, no NCAA berth. It’s mano a mano and kind of a reprieve from the team duals.”

Play all three days begins at 10 a.m. The team championship is scheduled for 1 p.m. Saturday and the pairs final at 2:30 p.m. Sunday.

BIG WEST BEACH VOLLEYBALL TOURNAMENT

At Queen’s Beach

Radio/TV: None

Live scoring: http://statbroadcast.com

Team championship

Double elimination

Friday

Cal State Northridge (17-6) vs. CSU Bakersfield (6-16), 10 a.m.

Long Beach State (23-6) vs. Sacramento State (3-15), 11 a.m.

Hawaii (32-3) vs. CSUN-CSUB winner, noon

Cal Poly (25-5) vs. LBS-SacState winner, 1 p.m.

Losers bracket quarterfinals, 2 & 3 p.m.

Saturday

Winners bracket semifinal, 10 a.m.

Losers bracket semifinal, 11 a.m.

Losers bracket championship, noon

Winners bracket winner vs. losers bracket winner, 1 p.m.

(If needed, 3 p.m. deciding final)

Pairs championship

Sunday

Single elimination

First round, 10 a.m.

1. Maglio-Schucht (UHi) vs. 16. Kurtz-Davis (SacSt)

8. Sato-Owens (CSUN) vs. 9. A. Van Winden-Nelson (CP)

2. T. Van Winden-Mirk (CP) vs. 15. Sukhov-Garrow (CSUN)

7. Kam-Weaver (UH) vs. Harward-Adamikova (LBS)

First round, 11 a.m.

3. Monkhouse-Martin (UH) vs. 14. Markle-Williams (CSUN)

6. Kruidhof-Nieto (LBS) vs. 11. Haynes-Hansen (CSUN)

4. Barber-Karelov (LBS) vs. 13. Nocetti-Brown (SacSt)

5. Sonny-Manley (CP) vs. 12. Ozee-Homayun (UH)

Quarterfinals, noon

1-16 winner vs. 8-9 winner

2-15 winner vs. 7-10 winner

Quarterfinals, 12:30 p.m.

3-14 winner vs. 6-11 winner

4-13 winner vs. 5-12 winner

Semifinals, 1:30 p.m.

Championship, 2:30 p.m.