A month ago the early test for many of the state's best volleyball teams was at Westwood High's Tournament of Champions. Friday (Oct. 7) and Saturday (Oct. 8) many of those same schools (32 in all) convene for the annual Goldwater Volleyball Festival at four westside high schools.

Schools competing are mostly from the Valley with a sprinkling of Tucson schools and Snowflake in the field. Here are the particulars for the tournament, that begins with pool play Friday at 9 a.m.:

Competition takes place at four high schools -- Goldwater, Sunnyslope, Greenway and Sandra Day O'Connor. Teams are seeded based on power-point rankings as of October 1. There are eight pools of four teams each with the schools ranked 1-4. Each school plays three pool games Friday and then a cross-pool matche later Friday to set up play on Saturday. The defending champion is Sunnyslope.

Here are the pool assignments: Pool A at Greenway HS -- Gilbert, Chaparral, Greenway, Shadow Mountain. Pool B at Sunnyslope HS --  Corona del Sol, Salpointe, Liberty and Westwood. Pool C at Goldwater HS -- Horizon, Desert Vista, Mesa Mountain View, Sunrise Mountain. Pool D at SDO HS -- Xavier, Ironwood, Ironwood Ridge, Sandra Day O'Connor. Pool E at SDO HS -- Mountain Ridge, Deer Valley, Northwest Christian, Valley Christian. Pool F at Goldwater HS -- Pinnacle, Centennial, Snowflake, Goldwater. Pool G at Sunnyslope HS -- Hamilton, Sunnyslope, Cactus, Desert Mountain. Pool H at Greenway HS -- Queen Creek, Rincon, Cactus Shadows and Boulder Creek.

Pools will be reconfigured at the end of play Friday with the new pool configuration starting Saturday at 8:30 a.m.  The Gold Division (top bracket) will compete at Goldwater HS; the Silver Divison at Sandra Day O'Connor HS; Bronze Division at Greenway HS and Copper Division at Sunnyslope HS. Semifinal matches for each division are set to begin at approximately 2:30 and 3:45 p.m.. Seventh- and fifth-place matches for each division are scheduled for 5 p.m. at each site and championship and third-place matches for each division  at 6:15 p.m.