Long Beach State Goes for Title : Volleyball: A record crowd is expected to root for Penn State tonight.

Coaches like to be prepared for everything--especially when they are contending for a national championship. There’s one thing, however, that Long Beach State Coach Brian Gimmillaro did not expect to find at the NCAA women’s volleyball final four: a hostile crowd.

Third-ranked Long Beach (31-2) will play seventh-ranked Penn State (31-4) in the NCAA final tonight at 5:30 PST at the University of Wisconsin Field House before what is expected to be a record crowd.

Tonight’s anticipated near sell-out in the 11,500-seat Field House is expected to break the previous attendance record for a final, set at Minneapolis in 1988, by about 2,000.

That will be nearly double the average attendance at a final during the last 12 years. It also figures to be the biggest crowd ever to watch an NCAA women’s volleyball match, topping the 11,032 who attended a regular-season match between UCLA and Nebraska at Lincoln, Neb.

And most of the spectators are expected to be rooting for Penn State, a member of the Big Ten Conference along with Wisconsin.

Gimmillaro was shocked to see the support for Penn State in the Nittany Lions’ semifinal upset of fourth-ranked Brigham Young on Thursday before a crowd of 10,270. Jenny Myszewski, a Penn State sophomore middle blocker, received a standing ovation from the crowd when she was introduced because she is from Wauwatosa, Wis., a Milwaukee suburb.

Gimmillaro suddenly realized that, even though Penn State is the farthest away from Wisconsin of any Big Ten team, and even though it has been playing volleyball in the conference for only three years, the Nittany Lions are local favorites in this NCAA final four.

“As a coach, you want to be organized and I think that I am, usually,” Gimmillaro said. “I had no idea that this could turn into an away match for us.”

Whomever the crowds have rooted for, their size has been a surprise. Wisconsin is not exactly a hotbed of women’s volleyball. Eight of the 12 NCAA titles have been won by California teams, and Hawaii has won three of the four others.

Bringing the NCAA final four to Wisconsin was the idea of former Badger Coach Steve Lowe, who led Wisconsin to its first appearance in an NCAA tournament in 1990. Lowe believed that by 1993 his team would contend for a spot in the final four and decided to bid for this event.

But nine days before Wisconsin’s 1991 season opener, Lowe, 36, died of cancer.

The school decided to continue in its pursuit of the tournament in memory of Lowe.

“I hope that he would be proud of how we play and how Penn State plays,” Gimmillaro said.

Long Beach, which defeated 14th-ranked Florida on Thursday in the semifinals, is making its third consecutive appearance in an NCAA final four. The 49ers won the NCAA title in 1989.

They are led by Danielle Scott, a 6-foot-2 middle blocker recently selected the national player of the year. Scott will have set a record for hitting percentage when she ends her career tonight. Her current hitting percentage is .430. The record is .420, set by Mary Eggers of Illinois from 1985-88.

Scott is so dominating that Russ Rose, Penn State’s coach, has all but given up on devising a game plan to stop her.

“I don’t think anybody can stop Danielle,” he said.

Penn State, making its first appearance in an NCAA final four, does not have a first-team All-American.

The Nittany Lions, the first Big Ten team to play in an NCAA final, are led by Salima Davidson, a second-team All-American junior setter who said she enjoys playing the role of the underdog.

“Not having pressure to win makes us a lot more loose and helps us be more relaxed and able to play,” she said.

Similarly, Gimmillaro downplayed the pressure of being the favorite.

“Thank God we’re here to have that pressure,” he said.