The sun came up this morning, there is discord in the Middle East and...

Oh, yes, the University of Hawai'i women's volleyball team is picked to win the Western Athletic Conference, again.

If you're counting — and coach Dave Shoji swears he gave up trying to keep track quite a while ago — just about every year, and for at least nine in a row now, UH has been the far and away preseason choice of the conference's coaches to win the regular season title. It should be noted that this also happens to be UH's 13th season of WAC volleyball participation and they have won it every year.

Which means either the WAC coaches have an unmatched track record for brilliance of foresight or the Rainbow Wahine have made winning the conference very predictable for a very long time. Care to guess which?

Rarely since the days of Joselyn Robins, Robyn Ah Mow and Angelica Ljungquist etc., have a conference's coaches dared to pick against UH and put it in writing. One of the last years they did, the 1995 season that was UH's last season in the Big West, the coaches got it badly wrong: The Rainbow Wahine went 31-1 (18-0 in conference) before moving to the WAC and the hope of other challenges.

The only coach who hasn't voted for the Rainbow Wahine to win the WAC is its own, Shoji. Not because he's modest or sandbagging anybody, but because conference rules prohibit voting for your own team. There is where the real battle has been waged in the WAC: the one to top Shoji's ballot for second-best.

Until 2006, WAC teams were just hoping, wishing to take a match from UH, though most were ecstatic at getting a game here or there since the Rainbow Wahine had gone 132 consecutive conference matches without a loss.

Playing the Rainbow Wahine close had been cause for vast celebration. Not until last year were the Rainbow Wahine really challenged for the title and they abruptly ended that illusion by taking both matches from second-place New Mexico State.

So, yes, you could say the bull's-eye has been as regular a part of the Rainbow Wahine's wardrobe as the green they wear. The top spot practically a birthright. The swagger earned.

"We kind of expect it (the favorite role) each year," Shoji said. "We wouldn't want it any other way. We want to be the team to beat and we have those kind of goals. We know we'll get everybody's best shot. And, that's a good thing."

One of these years somebody else might actually win the WAC. But until then, familiar — and spoken for — is the favorite role in the WAC.

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