U.S. OLYMPIC FESTIVAL : Building for the Future : Family affair: Westlake Village’s Hoang brothers spare the furniture and take shots at a real goal in Minneapolis.

It is painfully obvious to the entire Hoang family when brothers Tommy, Sammy and Bihn have been practicing their favorite sport.

A quick check of the furniture around the family’s Westlake Village home reveals numerous telltale signs.

An additional chip on the grand piano or a scratch on the leg of the coffee table is a clue that the boys have been at it again.

They have turned the living room into a hockey surface.

Well, at least they don’t slice up the carpet with their skates. The Hoangs do not play that type of hockey.

They play field hockey, an infinitely more convenient game that can be played just about anywhere--den, family room and bedrooms included.

A single ball--a billiard ball will suffice--and some curved wooden sticks are the only necessities.

During informal sessions, what constitutes the goal is left up to the imagination.

“We like the sofa,” Sammy said. “It bounces back.”

Which distinguishes it from the windows.

“Every time my dad sees a broken window he says it reminds him of us,” Tommy said.

Such is life in a household full of athletes. The Hoangs, and their furniture, certainly aren’t the only ones who suffer periodically from battle scars.

There are nine other combinations of brothers competing at the Festival, including five in field hockey.

And imagine the mess if brothers Rob and Doug Stull, competitors in the modern pentathlon, ever decided to practice around the house.

The swimming and running parts doubt would be acceptable. Maybe even the fencing and horse jumping.

But the shooting?

In all, there are 52 athletes and coaches forming 25 different family combinations at the Festival.

The Hoangs form the front line for the West field hockey squad, with Tommy, 23, at center, Sammy, 20, to his right and Binh, 16, to his left.

Tommy won a bronze medal as a member of the U. S. team in the 1987 Pan American Games, although he is best remembered for the ordeal he experienced in qualifying for the squad.

A very important prerequisite for making an American team, Hoang learned, was to be an American. He was not.

Although his family left its native Vietnam in 1975, Tommy didn’t become a citizen until midway through the Olympic Festival three years ago.

He flew to North Carolina to take part in practice, flew back to Los Angeles to take his oath of citizenship, then returned to the Festival in time to play in his team’s medal game.

This is the third Festival for Tommy and Sammy; Binh, a wrestler and football player at Westlake High, is making his debut.

On Friday, Sammy and Binh each scored his first goal of the competition. Tommy scored twice earlier in the week.

And just as always Tommy led, Sammy came in second and Binh followed--they scored in the same order they took up the sport.

“Once I picked up a stick, they picked up a stick,” Tommy said. “We compete against each other in everything we do--Nintendo games, any sport.”

And just because they are members of the same Festival team doesn’t mean the Hoangs have stopped needling each other.

“Now it’s ‘Who is going to be the leading scorer of the tournament?’ ” Tommy said.

Field hockey has numerous followers in the Conejo Valley, where the Hoangs live, but the brothers’ best playing partners are each other.

“The only time we practice is when we practice together,” Tommy said.

The condition of the family’s furnishings is proof positive.