Bob Barlow moved to Hawaii 15 months ago to take the job as president of Oceanic Time Warner Cable. It didn’t take long, he said, before he "caught the fever" that is Hawaii women’s volleyball.

Barlow has tickets to today’s NCAA regional matches at the Stan Sheriff Center. It’s a sellout and the only options for those without tickets are radio (KKEA, 1420-AM, espn1420am.com) and streaming video on ESPN3.com on the internet.

There will be no television coverage. And it hasn’t been for lack of trying.

Both Oceanic and the University of Hawaii athletic department officials have pleaded with the NCAA and ESPN to allow UH an exemption to televise today’s two semifinals in addition to having it streamed live on the web. And?

In volleyball terminology: stuffed.

Despite some compelling arguments — the sellout, an older fan base that might not have computer access, expensive travel from neighbor islands even if there were tickets remaining — Hawaii’s request was denied.

"It doesn’t make any sense and it’s disappointing," Barlow said. "Everybody’s tried. Our corporate people, the university. Our phones are backed up, but it’s (an ESPN) corporate-wide policy for all the regionals.

"We wanted to put it on as a service to the people in Hawaii. We still feel a responsibility. If they change their mind, we’ll be ready."

Barring a last-minute change of heart by ESPN, today’s matches won’t be on TV. Saturday’s 7 p.m. final will be on ESPNU.

Oceanic, in its first year as UH’s broadcast partner, had carried all home volleyball matches either free or on pay-per-view this season, as well as last month’s Western Athletic Conference semifinals from Las Vegas.

"What we were asking for was a secondary platform to the Internet platform, which was TV," said John McNamara, UH associate athletic director for external affairs. "This is difficult for us. We do want fans to know that we made that extra effort to reach out to the NCAA and ESPN.

"They listened, but in the end, this is a contract between ESPN and the NCAA."

To that end, the UH website has an open letter to its fans that reads, in part, "We wanted to ensure that (the telecast) was easily accessible for all our fans. We were informed by ESPN today (Thursday) that it be solely on ESPN3. We know this situation is not optimal but … we must abide by the final decision."

Beneath the letter is a banner that links to the ESPN3.com information.

ESPN3 is available free to Oceanic standard cable subscribers. HawaiianTelcom has ESPN3 available to subscribers with DSL.