Let the Big West free-for-all begin.

Hawaii’s four years in the California-based league may not have been long enough to develop any hard grudges, so the Rainbow Warriors are choosing to spit venom in every direction.

“I think every game’s a rivalry for us in this conference,” said wing Aaron Valdes, who was named to the preseason all-conference team. “Everybody wants to beat everybody … but really only one team comes out of this conference, so that makes it big for us.”

The nine-team Big West might still be a one-bid entrant to the NCAA Tournament, but there’s no doubt it is on the rise. Four teams, including UH, placed in the top 100 in NCAA RPI as of Monday.

UH’s opening opponent Wednesday, Cal Poly, has played a tough schedule and is just outside of that group.

“Our (Big West) strength of schedule is really starting to help our strength of conference,” Mustangs coach Joe Callero said. “I saw last week the RPI of our conference was 10th, slightly ahead of the West Coast Conference for the first time I have seen in my seven years.”

It has since dropped to 12th, but that still represents an improvement for a league used to being in the mid- to high-teens. Last year it hovered around 13 or 14 at this point of the season.

First-year UH coach Eran Ganot compared the Big West’s situation to the WCC when he first started on staff at Saint Mary’s in the early 2000s.

“It’s been on the rise for some time, coming off its best year in about a decade,” Ganot said. “There was some misconception that there’d be some drop-off because of some players like a (Corey) Hawkins and an Alan Williams graduating. That hasn’t been the case. The reality is it’s been even better this year and it’s exciting. We look forward to embracing the challenge.”

Ganot chalked it up, in part, to continuity among the Big West coaches. He is the only newcomer to the group.

At full strength, UH has been the Big West’s best offensive team and projects to contend among the top third. Defending tournament champion UC Irvine has been formidable defensively behind 7-foot-6 center Mamadou Ndiaye, while Long Beach State, dormant the past couple of seasons, is close to its past potency behind an infusion of transfers.

UC Santa Barbara just earned its first first road win over a Pac-12 team in 12 years, 83-78 at Washington on Dec. 28. It represents the best nonconference win for the Big West this season.

UH had the benefit of playing 12 home games, four more than any other team in the Big West. However, the Rainbows did their part and came close to a true stunner, playing up and up with then-No. 3 Oklahoma in the Hawaiian Airlines Diamond Head Classic.

The Rainbows went 11-2 through their home-heavy slate, and got big games throughout from several players, most notably point guard Roderick Bobbitt, Valdes and forward Stefan Jankovic.

“We had a great preseason. Played some good teams and we played good ourselves,” said co-captain Quincy Smith. “I think we’re just confident in ourselves, our abilities, our talent. We know we can play with the best teams in the nation. But we can’t take the teams in the Big West lightly, because we always play good in the preseason and it seems like when we get in Big West we let up. So I think this year we’re going in with a mind-set of playing hard, no matter who we’re playing.”

Smith’s younger brother, Kendall, plays for Big West foe Cal State Northridge.

“He’s talking about how many points he’s going to score; I’m saying, ‘We’re going to beat you guys, we’re going to make the Tournament,’ ” Smith said with a grin.

In three years of Big West play, UH has never finished better than fourth in the regular season. However, the Rainbows made a run as the 5 seed at Anaheim’s Honda Center last year, beating Long Beach State and regular-season champ UC Davis before falling to UC Irvine 67-58 in the Big West title game.

That brought Benjy Taylor’s whirlwind interim season to a sudden end and ushered in a clean break, with Ganot taking over.

Behind their new coach and a new four-out, one-in offense, the Rainbows aim to end a 13-year NCAA Tournament drought with three wins in March — not two.

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CAL POLY MUSTANGS (6-7)

Coach: Joe Callero (seventh season)

Preseason poll: Sixth

RPI: 123

Big games: at UCLA (L, 88-83); vs. Fresno State (W, 77-65); at USC (L, 101-82); at Texas A&M (L, 82-63)

Key players: G David Nwaba (11.5 ppg, 5.6 rpg, 4.7 apg); F Joel Awich (10.9 ppg, 5.2 rpg); G Reese Morgan (9.8 ppg, 47.7 3FG%)

Notes: The Mustangs have played faster this season but are still among the nation’s best in fewest turnovers per game (10.6). Their 75.5 ppg is the highest under Callero. … Senior F Brian Bennett, a BWC second-teamer last year, has played mostly as a reserve coming off offseason knee and ankle injuries. … Poly plays the deepest rotation in the league, with no player averaging more than 26.8 minutes per game and 10 players going at least 14.3 minutes.

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CAL STATE FULLERTON TITANS (7-6)

Coach: Dedrique Taylor (third season)

Preseason poll: Ninth

RPI: 219

Big games: vs. Nevada (W, 75-66); at Washington (L, 87-69); vs. Oregon State (L, 82-69)

Key players: G Tre’ Coggins (16.3 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 39.6 3FG%); G Malcolm Brooks (14.2 ppg, 45.1 3FG%); G Khalil Ahmad (12.8 ppg, 40.0 3FG%)

Notes: The new-look Titans, last year’s odd team out of the BWC tournament, turned heads in opening 6-1 to match their best start since 1986, but lost five in a row after that. Still, they need just two wins to match last season’s total. … Coggins, a transfer from Air Force, played two minutes as a reserve in the Falcons’ CIT postseason tournament win over UH in Honolulu in March 2013. Brooks is a one-and-done transfer from Pepperdine, while Ahmad is a true freshman.

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CAL STATE NORTHRIDGE MATADORS (5-9)

Coach: Reggie Theus (third season)

Preseason poll: T-Seventh

RPI: 289

Big games: at USC (L, 96-61); at UCLA (L, 77-45); at San Francisco (L, 65-61)

Key players: G Kendall Smith (17.0 ppg, 2.8 apg); G Michael Warren (15.0 ppg, 4.9 rpg, 82.4 FT%); F Tre Hale-Edmerson (8.4 ppg, 5.3 rpg, 1.6 bpg)

Notes: The Matadors are trying to recover from last year’s devastating academic issues, and gone are mainstays Stephan Hicks and Stephen Maxwell. … Smith, a transfer from UNLV, is the younger brother of UH’s Quincy Smith. He became eligible at the semester break. … Big man Olalekan Ajayi leads the BWC in rebounds (9.3). Matadors are last in the league in field goals and 3-pointers made per game, but tops in free throws made and percentage (72.5).

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HAWAII RAINBOW WARRIORS (11-2)

Coach: Eran Ganot (first season)

Preseason poll: Third

RPI: 77

Big games: at Texas Tech (L, 82-74); vs. Northern Iowa (W, 68-52); vs. Oklahoma (L, 84-81); vs Auburn (W, 79-67)

Key players: G/F Aaron Valdes (15.5 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 2.8 apg); F/C Stefan Jankovic (14.1 ppg, 6.2 rpg, 54.4 FG%); G Roderick Bobbitt (14.0 ppg, 5.8 apg, 2.4 spg)

Notes: UH leads the league in a host of categories, including scoring (81.0 ppg), field-goal percentage (47.8), rebounding margin (plus-7.0), assists (16.9) and steals (8.8). The Rainbows are next to last, however, in 3-point percentage (32.6) and free-throw percentage (63.9). UH has three of the top four ball thieves in the league in Bobbitt, Isaac Fleming and Quincy Smith, who combine for 5.7 spg. … Valdes is one of 11 players in Division I to have a triple-double this season, and the only player in the Big West.

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LONG BEACH STATE 49ERS (6-9)

Coach: Dan Monson (ninth season)

Preseason poll: Fourth

RPI: 82

Big games: vs. BYU (W, 66-65); at Colorado State (W, 83-77); at UCLA (L, 83-76); at Duke (L, 103-81)

Key players: G Nick Faust (15.7 ppg, 5.4 rpg, 41.8 3FG%); F Travis Hammonds (10.7 ppg, 5.5 rpg); G Justin Bibbins (9.0 ppg, 5.8 apg)

Notes: Monson’s annual nonconference slog got off to a promising start with the win over BYU, but there’ve been missed opportunities against Oklahoma State, San Diego State, Pepperdine and others. …. Behind the Maryland transfer Faust, the rebuilt Beach is the best 3-point-shooting team in the league (39.6), and takes full advantage with the most attempts (22.5 per game) and makes (8.9). Bibbins, a former backup to departed all-leaguer Mike Caffey, is tops in the BWC in assist-to-turnover ratio at 3.6.

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UC DAVIS AGGIES (5-8)

Coach: Jim Les (fifth season)

Preseason poll: T-Seventh

RPI: 255

Big games: vs. Portland (W, 79-66); at Saint Mary’s (L, 81-67)

Key players: F Josh Fox (12.6 ppg, 6.6 rpg, 57.4 FG%); G Siler Schneider (11.1 ppg, 42.9 3FG%); F Neal Monson (10.0 ppg, 8.8 rpg)

Notes: The Aggies lost most of their breakthrough regular-season championship crew from last year — most notably BWC Player of the Year Corey Hawkins — and it’s showed: They have lost six straight against Division I teams. Fox, a former freshman at Riverside who once entertained UH as a transfer option out of junior college, has emerged as the face of the team. UCD is good on the boards but could use some playmaking help, as it’s worst in both assists (11.6) and turnovers (14.9).

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UC IRVINE ANTEATERS (11-5)

Coach: Russell Turner (sixth season)

Preseason poll: First

RPI: 47

Big games: at Central Florida (W, 61-60, OT); at Saint Mary’s (L, 70-60); at Utah State (W, 73-63); at Kansas (L, 78-53)

Key players: C Mamadou Ndiaye (12.1 ppg, 7.3 rpg, 2.7 bpg, 66.4 FG%); G Luke Nelson (11.5 ppg, 4.1 apg, 96.2 FT%); G Alex Young (9.1 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 4.3 apg)

Notes: The defending BWC tournament champions have three straight 20-win seasons and got an offseason scare that they’d lose Turner to a lucrative offer from George Mason, but he turned it down after nearly leading the ’Eaters to an NCAA Tournament upset of Louisville. … The 7-6 Ndiaye now shares honors as the tallest player in college basketball, with UCF’s Tacko Fall … UCI posts the stingiest defensive numbers in the BWC — 64.6 ppg allowed, 38.8 percent field-goal shooting allowed and 5.1 blocks per game.

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UC RIVERSIDE HIGHLANDERS (9-7)

Coach: Dennis Cutts (third season)

Preseason poll: Fifth

RPI: 272

Big games: vs. Santa Clara (W, 77-63); at San Francisco (L, 58-57); vs. UNLV (L, 73-62)

Key players: G Jaylen Bland (16.3 ppg, 80.0 FT%, 40.4 3FG%); F Taylor Johns (14.5 ppg, 8.2 rpg); F Secean Johnson (11.2 ppg, 5.4 rpg)

Notes: UCR’s nine wins are its most ever before Big West play begins, but a 19-point home loss to Cal State Bakersfield to end nonconference was a setback for Cutts’ outfit. Cutts, a former interim head coach, recently received an extension through 2020 after last season’s 14-win effort, the program’s second-most. … Bland’s 3.5 3s made per game ranks eighth in the country, while at the other end UCR has been elite at defending the 3 at 28.2 percent allowed.

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UC SANTA BARBARA GAUCHOS (6-7)

Coach: Bob Williams (18th season)

Preseason poll: Second

RPI: 49

Big games: at Cal (L, 85-67); vs. Oregon State (L, 71-59); vs. USC (L, 75-63); at Washington (W, 83-78)

Key players: G Michael Bryson (19.8 ppg, 6.0 rpg, 2.8 apg, 47.7 FG%); G Gabe Vincent (12.3 ppg, 38.0 3FG%); F John Green (11.7 ppg, 5.7 rpg)

Notes: Life after Big Al Williams was difficult at first for the Gauchos, who started 2-7 before their current four-game winning streak. Bryson has picked it up lately, however, earning Big West Player of the Week honors for helping UCSB to a road sweep of Washington and Seattle. Bryson, the league’s leading scorer by a margin of more than three points per game, hit a school-record nine 3s for a career-high 36 points in the latter.