IMO, it's still something like a 90% likelihood of the outcome in a couple years being a reverse merger with the Mountain West. I hear you regarding basketball. My suspicion there based on the $ the Mountain West got from WSU and OSU for football led them to look to the WCC to save money since basketball and other non-revenue sports don't make WSU or OSU much money anyway, and they are deprioritizing those sports for now (and perhaps indefinitely).
For context, basketball at WSU has been tough most of the time, other than a few decent eras for a while under exceptional coaches. Power 5 affiliation sold enough recruits, coaches, etc. to make football have at least a reasonable chance of being solid, even if the deck was still stacked against them. Tougher with basketball due to P5/P6 status being less meaningful and the rural location(s) being even bigger issues. Kids reasonably could choose any number of smaller schools in numerous cities and still have a shot at getting in the NCAA tournament, in many cases a much better one than at WSU or OSU, and otherwise playing at a pretty high level. Was Power 5 or bust, for the most part, in football.