Even before Southern California put the finishing touches on back-to-back national championships in January, we knew the University of Hawai'i football team would have its work cut out for it in this season's Sept. 3 opener.

Not until now, however, did we know just how much work that might entail.

So, thanks to the folks in Las Vegas for finally putting a number on it: 32 points. That's the betting line at the Stardust among other places, we're told, where USC is giving nearly five touchdowns. This week, anyway.

That's undoubtedly more of a statement about the Trojans, who are a galactically known quantity than the Warriors, who remain question marks in any number of areas. While USC's changes are mostly on the reshuffled coaching staff, not in the constantly arriving bus loads of high school All-American talent, UH's ponderables are everywhere: quarterback, receivers, running backs, defense. You name it.

The combination leaves UH an underdog of rare proportions even if you discount the boasts of USC safety Darnell Bing who, when asked if he had any concerns, told the Los Angeles Daily News recently: "We'll just see how quick the offense scores against Hawai'i. The first play or third play."

To be sure, there are other teams staring at longer odds in college football's opening weekend this year — Ball State is a 38-point underdog at Iowa and Louisiana-Lafayette a 37-point underling at Texas to name two. But, nobody comes close as a home team.

Of course, no non-Bowl Championship Series school has somebody of the Trojans' profile to come calling, either. You don't see Tennessee going to Alabama-Birmingham, or Louisiana State dropping in on North Texas, for instance. Rather, the traffic is decidedly one way.

Where UH is concerned, you have to go to 1998, when Michigan was a 38 1/2-point favorite, to find the days of the Warriors as a bigger underdog in Halawa. The Wolverines, who employed Tom Brady and Drew Henson as two of their four quarterbacks that day, hammered the final nail into an 0-12 season, 48-17.

And UH has managed to catch USC at its best lately. Even in their 2003 visit to the Coliseum, a 61-32 loss, and their 1999 opener, a 62-7 setback, the Warriors were "only" 25-point underdogs.

But if there is inspiration to be drawn from UH's underdog role, perhaps the Warriors need only dig through their 1978 film archives to find it. In that USC national championship season oddsmakers listed UH as a 39-point write-off to the Rose Bowl-bound Trojans.

Yet, trailing just 7-5 against a team that included Charles White, Marcus Allen and Ronnie Lott among a star-studded lineup, Hawai'i was in a position to win it until the final eight minutes of a 21-5 loss.

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