When this generation of Hawaii and Long Beach State volleyball players were born, the country’s most compelling rivalry resided in the Big West with their predecessors.

On the road to four national championships, the Rainbow Wahine blew through the 49ers the first 16 times they played. But in 1989, with future Olympian Tara Cross, the Beach broke through in the Northwest Regional final against UH and future Olympian Teee Williams.

Long Beach would end five consecutive Hawaii postseasons and win three national titles of its own, behind Olympians Danielle Scott in 1993 and Misty May in 1998. By the end, the Wahine were in the Western Athletic Conference and the series basically fizzled out.

Until now. The Beach comes back tonight to take on a Hawaii team that has returned to the Big West after a 16-year break. They will play again in SoCal in a month, then again and again in the Wahine’s new/old conference.

The 49ers might be dinged up and unranked, but the eighth-ranked Wahine and coach Dave Shoji know they need to be ready for anything against the 12-time BWC champions.

The rivalry was never about respect. It was about attitude and fighting to get to the final four. The players are gone, but the coaches remain the same and have vivid memories.

Shoji’s most vivid involve the angst his Wahine went through in the 1990s when the Beach kept swamping their season.

"It’s been kind of a tough relationship between our players," Shoji says. "They didn’t like each other. Back in the day our players …it was a respectful thing, but that was one team we wanted to beat more than anybody else."

The first time the teams met post-Big West in the postseason came here, in the 2000 NCAA West Regional semifinal. The Wahine won in five sets and nearly 3 hours.

Hours later, the 49er vans were still parked curbside at the Stan Sheriff Center. LBSU coach Brian Gimmillaro wasn’t done with his team yet.

He hasn’t changed. The 49ers are still the most "technique-oriented" team in the country, according to Shoji, and Gimmillaro still pursues perfection.

What Gimmillaro remembers most about these teams’ first round in the Big West are all those Northwest Regionals that included two — his team and Hawaii — or three of the country’s top-ranked teams. Back when the NCAA didn’t seed and rarely sent teams out of their region, the four best teams rarely made it to the "final four."

"The good news is," Gimmillaro says, "according to several people, including very knowledgeable fans in Hawaii, some of the best volleyball matches in history were played between the two of us. The bad news is they weren’t seen by the rest of the country because we were in regionals and not a final-four setting.

"I think some of those matches certainly would have influenced volleyball on a national level and only for the good. To eliminate those matches from the national spotlight was really …I will not understate how detrimental that was to the young people who played, the programs involved and to the country."

This isn’t the same Long Beach State team Hawaii left. The last of its eight final fours was in 2001. It hasn’t won an NCAA match or shown up in the final ranking since 2008.

Gimmillaro believes he has been snake-bit by injuries over the past decade.

"Literally half the kids we recruit either get some serious injury in their junior or senior year in high school and we have to rehab them," he says, "or they have surgery in high school or need surgery when they get here."

This year, the Beach lost 6-foot-6 all-region middle Haleigh Hampton — third nationally in blocking last year — and returning setter Erin Juley to injury before this season. Alma Serna, a 6-3 sophomore middle, was hurt in the first match and came back last week, earning BWC Player of the Week honors immediately.

Gimmillaro says Serna didn’t practice this week, but she played all four sets in Thursday’s loss at Northridge and might be Shoji’s biggest worry with two first-year starters in the middle.

Shoji admits he doesn’t "relish" the thought of preparing for the Beach twice a year again, but he welcomes the competition. Gimmillaro has waited for this moment for 16 years.

"I think it’s good for everyone involved," he says. "It’s good for our fans, for the Hawaii fans, good for volleyball. I hope it gives the conference some credibility. And maybe one of these days we will get good enough and if Hawaii plays well enough we will play each other in a final-four match. Before or after, Dave and I can talk about how the quality is the same as it was in the past."

___________

RABID RIBALRY

Hawaii 24, Long Beach State 15, 1 tie
>> Hawaii wins first 16 aside from a 1-1 tie at 1978 UCLA/NIVT tournament.
>> LBSU’s first win comes in five-game 1989 NCAA Northwest Regional final.
>> That 1989 victory jump-starts a 13-4 49er surge in the series, and they end Wahine’s season again in 1990 (NCAA Northwest Regional semifinal), 1991 (NCAA Northwest Regional final), 1993 (NCAA Northwest Regional final) and 1994 (NCAA Northwest Regional semifinal). 
>> Since Hawaii joined the WAC in 1996 it has 4-2 edge over the 49ers and has ended their season twice (2000 NCAA West Regional semifinal and 2006 NCAA second round).