By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

The Sporting News College Football magazine says the University of Hawai'i has the best coaching staff in the Western Athletic Conference.

And Athlon Sports College Football 2002, which rates the Warriors as having "arguably the best special teams in the conference, if not the nation" also notes, "there may not be a better pair of linebackers in the WAC than (Chris Brown and Pisa Tinoisamoa)."

For all the compliments the preseason magazines are tossing UH's way after a 9-3 season — and it almost sounds like the postseason awards banquet revisited — there is one you won't see on any of the pages: WAC favorite.

Depending on which magazine you pick up, you can find any of three schools — Boise State (in three publications) or Louisiana Tech and Fresno State, one each — tabbed as the preseason favorite. But not UH.

Despite the momentum with which UH ended last season — and Athlon says, "there may not have been a hotter team in college football at the end of the 2001 season than the University of Hawai'i" — and a bunch of returnees, most publications don't expect the Warriors to pick up where they left off.

Of the magazines currently in release or due out soon, only one (Phil Steele's College Football Preview) predicts UH to finish as high as third. And, that's in a tie with Fresno State.

The early consensus of the guessperts is that UH will repeat its finish of last year, fourth place in the 10-team WAC.

While there are the obvious questions posed about the health of quarterback Tim Chang, the filling of first-round draft choice Ashley Lelie's shoes and replacing starters on the offensive line and at safety, it is the schedule that poses the most intriguing and demanding ones.

It is the schedule, with five trips to the continent, that, at this point at least, probably separates the Warriors from championship favorites in a lot of people's minds.

And, not without reason. As part of a 13-game regular-season schedule, the Warriors will play a school-record five road games, including a non-conference appearance at Brigham Young, where UH has yet to win a game. This road schedule offers the added challenge of the Warriors' first trip to Boise State, the consensus preseason conference favorite. (UH does not play defending conference champion Louisiana Tech this season)

This is on top of a mounting even-numbered year slump. Not only have the Warriors not managed a winning season in an even-numbered year since 1992, their Holiday Bowl season, they haven't won more than three games in any of them.

Of course, it is no coincidence that most recently the even-numbered seasons have also been when the conference scheduling rotation has dealt the Warriors their toughest hand, sending them to Fresno State, Rice and Texas-El Paso where they have lost their last seven combined road games.

Meanwhile, in odd-numbered years, the road has been much kinder with stops at Southern Methodist and Tulsa, where UH has yet to lose in conference.

The preseason magazines paint a picture of UH as team with a lot going for it this season in so many areas. Whether the Warriors are up to the schedule looms as the big question.