"It's disappointing, but we'll have to live with it," said Wilton, who wanted the Warriors to practice in a setting comparable to UCLA's 12,800-seat Pauley Pavilion.

Last week, the Sheriff Center and Gym I, the Warriors' usual practice facility, were reserved for gymnasts. Last week Tuesday, the Warriors' practice in Gym II was cut short by 30 minutes because a physical education class needed the facility.

Yesterday, the Warriors were back in Gym I. "We'll try to get in a good practice at UCLA" on Friday, Wilton said. "Hopefully, that should be enough."

UCLA usually plays its regular-season home matches on the wooden basketball floor. But during the playoffs, a plastic-like surface is placed atop the wooden floor.

While the practice schedule remains unsettled, UH's strategies are in place. Wilton said he has completed scouting reports on the seven other teams in the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation tournament. Using the DataVolley program, Wilton installed the information on his laptop computer's hard drive.

Wilton has charts listing statistics and tendencies of each opponent's serving and defensive rotations. For instance, when an opposing team is serving out of, say, the third rotation, the chart will show which hitter is likely to be set and the direction in which he probably will hit. Wilton said he spent about six hours producing a detailed scouting report on each opponent.

Much of his information came from video coordinator Radford Nakamura's special editing system. Nakamura will take a video of an opponent's match and encode every play. If Wilton wants to see an opponent's third defensive rotation, he can punch in a code into his laptop and, within seconds, clips of every play from that rotation will be available.

"It makes it easy," Wilton said. "You can watch an entire five-game match in about 19 minutes."

• Moving on up: Following last week's split against Pepperdine, the Warriors ascended one place, to No. 5, in this week's USA Today/American Volleyball Coaches Association top-15 poll.

UH swapped places with sixth-ranked Cal State Northridge in the rankings, even though the Matadors finished fifth and the Warriors sixth in the MPSF standings.

"The only thing that matters is what happens in the league, and we didn't pass Northridge," Wilton said. He downplayed the poll's significance as a "Monday morning exercise," a reference to the voting deadline.

Brigham Young remained No. 1, receiving 14 of the 16 first-place votes.

•	MPSF Tournament First round • WHO: Hawai'i (17-11 overall, 13-9 MPSF) at UCLA (23-5, 17-5) • WHERE: Pauley Pavilion, Los Angeles • WHEN: Saturday, 4 p.m. Hawai'i Time • Radio: Live on KKEA (1420 AM)

• New format: Wilton said the winner of the MPSF tournament will be invited to next year's UH-hosted Outrigger Invitational. If UH wins the MPSF tournament, the runner-up will be invited. The past two Outrigger tournaments included UH, representatives from the East and Midwest, and an international team. Because matches against international teams do not count, teams would play many of their reserves, prompting Wilton's decision to change formats.