WHAT: Washington State (11-20, 4-14) vs. Oregon (19-12, 10-8)

WHERE: T-Mobile Arena (18,000), Las Vegas, Nev.

WHEN: Wed., March 13, 8:30 p.m. PT (Approx.)

TV/RADIO: Pac-12 Network (Ted Robinson, Bill Walton, Lewis Johnson); Washington State IMG Sports Network (Matt Chazanow)

Could Wednesday’s Pac-12 Men’s Basketball Tournament first round matchup between Washington State and Oregon be the last game embattled Ernie Kent coaches for the Cougars?

Possibly.

WSU athletic director Pat Chun may already know the answer to that question. But if he does, he isn’t saying except to say he and Kent have had “a lot of dialogue” throughout the 2018-19 season, Chun’s first full basketball season since his hiring in February 2018.

“We communicate frequently,” Chun said Tuesday on the weekly ‘Cougs in 60’ program hosted by Derek Deis. “We’ve had the up and downs that every season has. When we’ve played our best, we did something that hasn’t been done in the Pac-12 for quite some time (road sweep at Arizona schools). But when we didn’t play our best, it has been a struggle.

“There’s a solution out there. Ernie and I are going to work hard to figure out what that is. Like last year, we’ll meet as soon as the season is over and have some deep conversations about what the next steps are in trying to get our program to where it needs to be. Nobody wants this basketball program to win as much as Coach Kent or I do. We just have to figure out what the best solution is.”

Kent, as always, remains optimistic about the Cougars’ future with him as head coach.

“We’ve come a long way,” Kent said. “There were spurts in the season where I felt we were the best team in the conference on both ends of the floor based on the way we were playing. We shocked a lot of people in this conference and around the country with how we played at Arizona and Arizona State. It gives me hope that you don ‘t have to be the most talented team in the conference. It’s the buy-in. If they buy in, this is a very good system for guys to play in.”

Washington State, the No. 11 seed for this week’s Pac-12 Tournament in Las Vegas, hasn’t won a conference tournament game since 2009. If WSU manages to end that decade-long losing streak against Oregon, they will face No. 3 seed Utah in the quarterfinals on Thursday night.

“Our destiny is in Vegas. Everybody gets to reset when you go to Las Vegas,” Kent said after last Saturday’s regular-season ending loss to Oregon State at Beasley Coliseum. “Normally, teams that have so many new guys and been through it, they can catch their wind. They play up because they get one more chance to redeem themselves.

“I’m anxious to get them on that stage down there. Let’s regroup, get down to Vegas and start a new season.”

PAC-12 TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE (March 13-14)

Wed., March 13

Game 1: USC (#8) vs. Arizona (#9), Noon (Pac-12 Network)

Game 2: Colorado (#5) vs. California (#12), 2:30 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)

Game 3: UCLA (#7) vs. Stanford (#10), 6 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)

Game 4: Oregon (#6) vs. Washington State (#11), 8:30 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)

Thur., March 14

Game 5: Washington (#1) vs. Game 1 Winner, Noon (Pac-12 Network)

Game 6: Oregon State (#4) vs. Game 2 Winner, 2:30 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)

Game 7: Arizona State (#2) vs. Game 3 Winner, 6 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)

Game 8: Utah (#3) vs. Game 4 Winner, 8:30 p.m. (Pac-12 Network)