PULLMAN - Washington State coach Ken Bone predicted the Cougars would be hit hard by a double-overtime loss to Oregon on Dec. 31 that was nearly a Cougars victory until an official's call extended the game. Perhaps that's why they have been so unstable this season.

All teams have their ups and downs during a long season, but the Cougars have been particularly turbulent on the court.

As the Cougars prepare to close their regular season at Oregon, Bone said he was trying to ignore the memory of the game in Pullman and get his team focused on qualifying for the postseason.

"I thought about it 10 minutes ago, but I have not thought about it since then," Bone joked on Tuesday. "It is what it is and we've moved on."

Plenty of Cougar fans haven't.

Washington State appeared to have beaten Oregon in the first overtime after DeAngelo Casto scored with 0.3 seconds left at home. But the Cougars were called for a rarely invoked technical foul after a bench player stepped onto the court in celebration of Casto's basket. Oregon sank both free throws to tie the game and send it into the second overtime, where Oregon prevailed 91-89.

It's not clear how much that outcome affected the rest of the league season. After all, the Cougars beat Oregon State two nights later, and went on to sweep the season series with Arizona and Southern Cal.

But Washington State (16-12, 6-10 Pac-10) has been unable to put together consistent efforts and that has left them tied with Oregon in the league cellar, despite the fourth-best overall record.

Heading into the last two games of the regular season, the Cougars can finish anywhere from the fifth to ninth seed in the Pac-10 tournament. They play at Oregon State (13-15, 7-9) tonight and at Oregon (14-14, 6-10) on Saturday.

If WSU sweeps this weekend it can be as high as the fifth seed and as low as the seventh seed, avoiding the first-day game between the eighth and ninth seeds. If they split, they can end up anywhere between the seventh and ninth seeds. If WSU is swept this weekend, it will end up with the ninth seed.

"Everyone wants to stay away from the 8-9 game," Bone said, because it means playing an extra game.

Washington State went through the nonconference season with a 10-2 record, losing only at No. 5 Kansas State and at No. 18 Gonzaga. They beat Louisiana State and won the title of the Great Alaska Shootout.

But once conference play started things got strange.

Three times in their past eight games they held big halftime leads, only to lose at California, Stanford and Washington. In their last game, they shot just 18 percent in the first half to fall behind Washington 35-21 at home, then outscored the Huskies in the second half and briefly held the lead before fading to lose.

The up-and-down play has extended to some of the players, most notably leading scorer Klay Thompson. The sophomore at one point was the leading scorer in the nation, at 28 points per game, and still ranks among the top 30 at 19.6 points.

But in his past three games he has scored eight, two and five points, on 4-of-35 shooting from the floor.

Bone is at a loss to explain the slump, or how to respond.

"The strategy is the same, not that it's worked," Bone said, with Thompson having the green light to keep shooting in hopes he will regain the form that allowed him to drop 43 points on San Diego in the title game of the Great Alaska Shootout.

"In practice he makes shots every day," Bone said. "His teammates believe in him."

Freshman point guard Reggie Moore has also struggled lately, failing to reach his scoring average of 13.2 in the past six games. Bone believes that's because opponents started giving Moore more attention after his first run through the league.

The only player who has consistently picked up the scoring load of late is Casto, the undersized post who has scored career highs with 19 points twice in the past six games.