WSU men’s basketball is 2-0 and avenged a loss to Prairie View A&M from a year ago. The women’s team is 3-0 with a huge win over Gonzaga in overtime. A hot start is always nice, but it is all about how you finish.

The Cougar football team started 4-0 with two ranked wins but is 0-6 since the bye week, soccer went 7-1 in the non-conference before finishing 2-5-4 in conference with no wins in their last four games. Even the once No. 4-ranked volleyball team has lost four of their last six including two unranked losses. 

There is a trend occurring within WSU sports in 2023. Hot starts, catastrophic finishes. Could it be the difficulty of the Pac-12? Of the 19 combined losses between the three sports, 18 have been handed to them by conference opponents. Or is there something bigger at play?

For years now there has been a phrase handed down upon WSU athletics, the dreaded words ‘Coug’d it?’ While there certainly are statistics to look at, and even some logistics, that has certainly not convinced the Cougar faithful. 

The easier truth to accept for fans is that the school must be cursed, and there is nothing they can do about it. But the basketball teams can.

A year ago, the women’s squad beat the odds and brought home the Pac-12 Championship, while the men’s team took strides historically, finishing above .500 in conference with a top-five road win against Arizona and earning a No. 1 seed in the NIT. 

While both fell short in their respective postseason tournaments, it is now three years in a row with a birth in the Big Dance for the women, and two straight years in the NIT for the men, with both having bigger goals for this season.

Now, the true test is if the hot starts can hold for the two programs. The next game for the men is a tough neutral site matchup against Mississippi State, while the women can take a peek at a ranked neutral site game against Maryland in just over a week.

Both would be statement wins early in the year, and provide an opportunity to earn major respect before entering into Pac-12 play later this season. That is step one, step two is keeping things rolling once there.

Yes, it is far down the line, and were it to happen, it would be even easier to chalk it up to a tough conference than in the fall sports, but to break the trend things will need to be different.

While there may not be a way to physically or logistically chalk up the fallout for WSU sports as of late, there is a chance ahead to put the suspicions to bed. Whether fair or not, it is up to the hoopers to reject the idea that a Cougar curse exists on the Palouse.