LAS VEGAS – Jock Perry scored 21 points, Arinze Chidom had eight points and 12 rebounds and UC Riverside beat Washington 57-42 on Tuesday for coach Mike Magpayo’s first victory with the Highlanders.

Washington men’s coach Mike Hopkins said more than once Sunday that this basketball season is “all about the kids” – providing them what he called “a sense of normalcy” when the rest of their lives are anything but normal.

The start to the season was less than ideal for the Washington men’s basketball team.

The Washington men’s basketball team had hoped to start its delayed season on Wednesday with the Husky Classic.

The first two seasons went almost perfectly for Mike Hopkins. A season for building a foundation and trust was followed by a season where everything meshed and Washington won a Pac-12 regular-season title and made a return to the NCAA Tournament.

The NCAA announced Monday it is planning to move the entire 68-team tournament to a single geographic area and is in negotiations with Indianapolis, originally scheduled to host the Final Four in April.

The former Syracuse assistant came to Washington as a low-profile name who quickly remade UW into a high-profile program.

SEATTLE – Less than a month before the start of the men’s college basketball season, there’s still much uncertainty surrounding the Washington Huskies.