The only race in the Pacific 10 Conference is now for second place, as UCLA has a two-game lead in the loss column over Stanford and Arizona with three weekends left. For all of those hoping for a late-season Bruin slide, forget it. UCLA finishes with USC, a trip to Oregon and the Washington schools at Pauley Pavilion. With that out of the way, here are notes from the Pac-10 conference...

Will the fourth team please stand up?: The assumption for a while has been that four teams from the Pac-10 would qualify for the NCAA Tournament, with UCLA, Stanford and Arizona being the givens. Yet the results of the past week are starting to cast some doubt on the probability of getting a fourth team. Cal (14-8 overall, 8-5 in the Pac-10) lost at Oregon and then ground out an ugly win over last-place Oregon State. The Golden Bears' main rival for the tournament berth, Washington, lost at Washington State Saturday.

The Huskies (14-7, 7-5) are in the most trouble of the two schools. They travel to the Bay Area this week, host UA and ASU next week and finish up in Los Angeles.

In all likelihood, UW would have to beat Cal Thursday, sweep the Arizona schools, beat USC and play Stanford and UCLA really close to have a shot at a tournament bid.

For Cal, which has been probably the most underachieving team in the conference, the problem is that you can count the number of quality wins they have on one hand € two (a home win against Arizona and a win at Washington State).

A 17-10 finish with the talent that the Golden Bears were thought to have at the beginning of the year might not be enough to get them in the big dance. In other words, Cal could do itself a big favor by beating Washington (thus securing fourth place for themselves) and finishing out 4-1.

"We didn't play great, but the objective is to win," Cal head coach Todd Bozeman said about the win over Oregon State. "So Oregon State is the last place team in the league. It doesn't matter. We got into a guts situation and we won the game."

It wouldn't hurt though to beat a few more good teams along the way.

Cougar climb: An interesting team down the stretch might be Washington State. While they are currently in seventh place (13-8, 5-7), the Cougars have won four straight to pull themselves into the postseason mix. If their final six games didn't include road trips to UCLA, Stanford and Cal (and UA at home), the Cougars might have had a shot at the NCAAs. The NIT looks more likely, although for a team that was 9-8, 1-6 just a few weeks ago, any postseason play probably sounds pretty good.

"It's important we get a string going, we've got a tough stretch ahead of us," Cougar forward Mark Hendrickson said.

With 13 rebounds against the Huskies, Hendrickson became the second leading rebounder in WSU history with 854 rebounds. Jim McKean grabbed 844 rebounds from 1966-68.

No more Murray: USC starting point guard Cameron Murray has decided to sit out the rest of the season. In a press release, Trojan interim coach Henry Bibby said the decision was reached by Murray, his mother and father so that Murray could focus on academics.

"It came to the point where they needed Cameron to focus more on his studies," Bibby said. "He'll practice with us everyday. He's still a part of this team. I respect his family's decision that education is first."

Murray, a 6-foot-1 sophomore, was averaging 7.4 points and a team-leading 4.6 assists a game.

The real McCoy: UCLA freshman Jelani McCoy set a school record with 80 blocked shots this season. He trailed David Greenwood's 1979 record by four shots going into Saturday's game with Arizona State, but he recorded six against the Sun Devils in the Bruins' 87-70 win. In his last two games, McCoy has 13 blocks.

Kenya's revival: One of the top guards in the Pac-10, Oregon's Kenya Wilkins was shooting just 30 percent from the field in conference play € until his explosion against Stanford. Wilkins, a junior, hit 13 of 19 shots, including an 18-footer at the buzzer to beat the Cardinal 64-62. He finished with 30 points, equaling a career high.

"He played his heart out today," Stanford's Brevin Knight said. "He had been in a slump lately, but he came out today and showed how good a point guard he is. I think people were starting to doubt how good he was, and he just showed them that he's still one of the best in the country."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.