It was like the old game show “Press Your Luck.”

The Rainbow Wahine volleyball team watched Sunday’s NCAA Selection Show hoping that “Hawaii” would pop up as one of the 16 seeds and host sites for this week’s first and second rounds.

When that didn’t happen, the Wahine’s collective focus turned to the regional brackets where top-seeded USC, fifth-seeded Washington, 13th-seeded BYU and 14th-seeded UCLA all loomed as possibilities. Hawaii avoided those “Whammies” — cheering loudest when it didn’t show up at Washington for a second consecutive year — but there was no sigh of relief when it came to where the NCAA had sent the Wahine.

Unseeded Hawaii (26-1) was placed in the Des Moines, Iowa Regional and will face TCU in the subregional hosted by SEC champion Texas A&M. The Horned Frogs (19-9, 9-7 Big 12) had an up-and-down conference season but had an eye-opening sweep of visiting Texas — the NCAA tournament’s No. 3 seed — five weeks ago.

“I watched some of that match where they beat Texas, so you know they can play at a really high level,” Hawaii coach Dave Shoji said. “They’re obviously a good team.

“We know that they’re vulnerable but we’ll need to look at that and see if we can’t exploit that.”

It won’t get any easier should the Wahine make it past the first round. Texas A&M, coached by Laurie Corbelli, whose husband John, is the associate head coach and 1974 Punahou School graduate.

The Aggies, an impressive 16-2 in the SEC, are 12-1 at home this season with the lone loss in five to Arkansas on Oct. 16. A&M puts its 14-match winning streak on the line against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (31-4, 16-0 Southland) which is making its first NCAA appearance.

It is Hawaii’s 34th appearance, 22nd straight, missing out only in the injury- plagued 15-12 season of 1992. The Wahine are looking to advance past the second round for the first time since 2011, the last time they were seeded in the 64-team field.

“It’s a little disappointing,” said junior opposite Nikki Taylor, expected to be named the Big West Player of the Year on Monday. “But it’s not too much of a shocker. We thought it would happen.

“All of our games will be a challenge and we don’t have the ability to look over anyone in the bracket.”

“The best part is we know where we are going and who we are going to face,” added junior setter Tayler Higgins. “It’s not a terrible draw but any team we were going to face was going to be either a seed or a pretty good team.

“It’s TCU first and that’s the focus.”

Friday’s winners meet on Saturday with the winner advancing to the Sweet 16 in Des Moines, Iowa. On the other side of that regional bracket are defending national champion Penn State, hosting and seeded seventh; the Nittany Lions take on MEAC champion Howard (18-13) while Atlantic 10 champion Dayton (26-5) and Big East champion Villanova (25-8) meet in the other first-round match.

Hawaii, with an Ratings Percentage Index of 26 last Monday, was the only Big West team chosen. Shoji said it was a little bit of a surprise that Long Beach State didn’t get selected; the 49ers had an RPI of 50 on Monday whereas Northern Iowa (52) and TCU (53) were at-large picks.

“And I really thought that Oregon (16-13, 10-10 Pac-12) and Arizona (19-13, 9-11 Pac-12) wouldn’t make the tournament,” he said. “There were several teams ahead of them (in the RPI) that didn’t get in but they chose to go with the Pac-12 teams.

“I guess that’s the power of the Big 5 conferences. And Oregon’s athletic director is on the committee.”

Of the 16 seeded teams, only BYU (No. 13, West Coast champion), and Creighton (No. 16, Big East champion) are not from Power Five conferences. However, Creighton did not put in a bid to host this week’s subregional with the last hosting duties going to North Carolina (20-9, 17-3 ACC).