Underneath what will surely be a lei-bedecked mound, you wonder what thoughts will parade through Mike Wilton's mind this weekend.

What echoes of the past will reverberate and what remembrances will stir in his final appearances as University of Hawai'i men's volleyball coach at the Stan Sheriff Center?

Wilton's 17-year stay as head coach ends with regular season matches against Southern California tonight and tomorrow and, until Dave Shoji makes his own exit someday, nobody will have title to more memories in the place or claim to more magic moments.

To know Wilton, the ex-Marine, is to understand that his laser-like focus will be on winning those final two matches, not retracing the steps of some remarkable history.

But afterward, as the curtain closes on the most successful reign in the school's men's volleyball history, there will be a lot to savor.

Not the last two seasons, the only losing ones in Wilton's three-decade resume as a men's and women's coach, but a mid-to-late 1990s golden age and beyond in Manoa. The confluence of a new arena and the arrival of Yuval Katz and his sidekicks — dubbed "the University of Tel Avid at O'ahu" by arch rival UCLA — gave us a period for which only the Fabulous Five, Derek Tatsuno's reign and the Colt Brennan senior season are its peers in a century of UH men's sports.

If this were a movie ending to Wilton's career, there would be a gyrating crowd jamming the place one more weekend. The stands would be awash in signs as the players and fans exchange "we aren't worthy" genuflections. Players would be stealthily shuttled out of the arena past adoring mobs in laundry carts. Signing post-game autographs would take longer than the matches themselves.

Once upon a time the Stan Sheriff Center was such a place. It was the high temple of men's volleyball. Fans came by the thousands — an average of 7,930 in 1997 alone — to be part of the atmosphere. Even visiting teams spoke in awe and envy of the scene.

Remarkably, it was accomplished on a shoe-string budget that, considering the investment, might have been the most productive bucks ever spent at UH.

Wilton's legacy is in showing us — and the nation — what men's volleyball could be capable of. Whether that magic can be recaptured by his successor or anybody else is a long shot. But Wilton leaves having set the bar at which all others will take aim.

And there should be considerable pride in holding his head up and walking away with that distinction.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.