In Las Vegas, anything can happen. The Cougars are hoping luck will be in their favor when they play the Stanford Cardinal today at 8:30 p.m. in the opening round of the Pac-12 Tournament.

Though the Cardinal (19-11, 10-8) has defeated WSU (10-20, 3-15) twice this year by more than 10 points in both games, the Cougars enter this matchup with momentum on their side after defeating the UCLA Bruins by 18 points last Saturday night at Beasley Coliseum.

 “I thought our guys did a real nice job of playing good solid basketball on both ends of the court,” WSU men’s basketball Head Coach Ken Bone said.

With the Cougars winning only three conference games all year, the team must now win four games in four days to have a chance at the NCAA Tournament.

“Our backs are against the wall and sometimes you’re in that situation, that brings the best out of you,” Bone said. “We’ve approached it that way, talked about it and if we want to keep going which we want to do obviously, then we really got to bring it tomorrow night against a good Stanford team.”

The Cardinal enters this matchup as the sixth seed in the tournament and is led by forwards Dwight Powell and Josh Huestis. Powell was selected to the 2014 All-Pac-12 First Team and is averaging 14.1 points and 7.2 rebounds this season. Huestis was selected to the 2014 All-Pac-12 Defensive Team and averages 1.9 blocks a game.

Bone said the team has worked on matching up against the size and quickness of the Stanford big men and is adjusting the defense to play more aggressively. However, the head coach said it’s difficult to simulate playing against players similar to Huestis and Powell because the Cougars do not have players similar to the caliber of the two big men.

Besides Huestis and Powell, the Cougars will have to deal with containing point guard Anthony Brown. The junior guard scored 30 points in the win against the Cougars in Pullman on Feb. 15.

“He’s the one that’s really lit us up,” Bone said. “Brown’s played really well and shot it well against us.”

Bone said the Cougars have done a good job in the past of focusing in on one key player and hope to do so against Brown Wednesday night.

If the Cougars defeat Stanford, then they’ll play Thursday night against the No. 3 seeded Arizona State Sun Devils (21-10, 10-8) in the second round of the tournament.