Beginning with Saturday's season opener, University of Hawai'i home football games will be a guinea pig in the Western Athletic Conference's behind-the-scenes trial run of instant replay this season.

It just won't affect the outcome of any on-field calls made in the Warriors' home games or stop play.

Replays will not be shown to the on-field officiating crew or made available to the stadium JumboTron, WAC officials said. The Warriors' Sept. 10 game at Michigan State will be the only UH game in which instant replay can be used to overturn an official's call.

The WAC is one of two Division I-A conferences that will not employ instant replay this year. Because of cost concerns, the WAC Board of Directors voted to study the concept before deciding whether to implement it for the 2006 season.

The WAC said it will station a two-member crew in the Aloha Stadium press box level to monitor calls. For the opener, Jim Blackwood, WAC supervisor of football officials, will work with the review crew. The locally contracted crew will use television feed and decide which plays should be reviewed, review them and time the process.

So far UH is the only site that will definitely experiment with instant replay. Fresno State and Boise State are also under consideration as sites for testing, the WAC office said. UH was chosen because all seven of its home games will be shown — by ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 or KFVE/Oceanic — this year.

WAC commissioner Karl Benson said the WAC expects to spend approximately $3,900 on the equipment and manpower for the UH trial runs.

At the end of the season Benson said the WAC will announce how many plays were reviewed and how many would have been overturned.

If replay were used under the WAC model being studied, officials in the press box would decide which plays should be reviewed and signal the referee to stop play.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com.