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Granted neither you nor I have the cash or the clout to convince a basketball coach to come to N.C. State, but that shouldn't stop us from speculating, right?

Let's just try not to speculate wildly. And kids, get your parents' permission before trying this.

I put together a list of possibilities for the Sunday paper. Here's a slight modification of it, with a name or two dropped and a name or two added.

1) Rick Barnes, Texas
The top choice. He's from Hickory, he can recruit, he's personable and he once got into a fight with Dean at the ACC tournament. What's not to like for a Wolfpack fan? His family ties and childhood memories of the State glory years will likely be enough for him to listen to a State offer. But it will take a large hunk of cash to uproot Barnes from Austin.

2) Frank Haith, Miami
If you can't get Barnes, then maybe you go after his former top assistant. Haith, a Western Alamance grad, has the local ties. He's got the recruiting chops. He's young and he reportedly definitely would take the job if offered. But he only has two years as a D-I head coach and there's that sticky matter of moving within the ACC.

3) Dereck Whittenburg, Fordham and Monte Towe, New Orleans
These two are grouped together because frankly, it's hard for either to merit serious consideration. Other than being alums who would provoke some nostalgia for State's two national titles, neither has been red-hot in coaching circles. Both had losing records this season. Each might get a courtesy interview, but nothing more.

4) Dave Odom, South Carolina
This name makes many Wolfpack fans cringe, but apparently it's being discussed by folks close to the selection process. Granted Odom's teams have spent far too much time in the NIT lately, but he does have those two ACC titles while at Wake. That's two more than State has had since 1987. Figure Odom as the ultimate Plan B in this search.

5) Sean Miller, Xavier
He's a young coach, he just took his team to the NCAA tournament and he has ties to N.C. State, having served as an assistant under Sendek. It's hard to tell at this point though, whether ties to Sendek would get you more just the animosity of a portion of the fan base. He looks unlikely.

6) John Calipari, Memphis
Calipari has the ego needed to think he can compete with, and move ahead of, Duke and UNC. Plus, while Memphis is doing well right now, it's still in Conference USA. But it would likely take a truckload of cash to bring Calipari to Raleigh, and he's a guy that has a rep for being just a little too slick. It's hard to see him meshing well with Fowler and Co.

7) Tubby Smith, Kentucky. The High Point grad has the North Carolina ties. And the thinking is that Smith might finally be so fed up with Kentucky fans and their constant sniping that he'd be willing to jump ship. Of course, State fans also have a rep for pretty high expectations. And then there's the matter of Tubby's salary, which is currently reported to be around $1.9 million. Yikes.

I could go on for some time, but I'll leave further conjecture to you. Feel free to chime in with other names that deserve consideration or if you have an issue with any of the names I've listed.

And to save you the trouble of asking, no, I'm not interested in the position.

Just having returned from Indianapolis, I have my list of Top 10 moments of Final Four Week 2006. From the home office somewhere in the Indiana Convention Center, here they are:

10. Bill Russell walking down the street alone and unimpeded, Friday afternoon
9. John Calipari having lunch with Billy Tubbs, Sunday afternoon
8. Tornado warnings force evacuations to hotel basement, Sunday night.
7. George Mason coach Jim Larranaga walking out to the court and high-fiving the pep band 75 minutes before tipoff, Saturday afternoon
6. Awe-struck fans watching Danny Ainge walk past them, Friday afternoon
5. Florida AD Jeremy Foley taking in the John Mellencamp concert, Sunday night
4. Bo Deans concert, Saturday afternoon. A great improvement from the musical entertainment I encountered last year during the tournament. That was The Fixx in Syracuse.
3. Joakim Noah post-championship game: "This doesn't just feel good. It tastes good."
2. Sign outside The Finish Line sportswear store in Circle City Mall: "Meet Seth Davis of CBS Sports. Limit of one autograph per person."
1. The ritual spitting on the RCA Dome, the building that stole my football team, Thursday morning.

Is none other than veteran right-hander Bill Hass. The longtime Greensboro sportswriter who recently retired from the News & Record will be throwing out the ceremonial first pitch before the Grasshoppers' season-opener tonight at First Horizon Park. Radar guns will be turned off when the side-armer (or so I'm told) deals to the plate. Lucky for him.

Speaking of the Hoppers and their talented former beatwriter, I received a couple of questions about the berm in left field.

As was mentioned in the graphic accompanying my story on changes to the berm Wednesday, the left-field fence has been replaced by a concrete support wall. A reader pointed out that this could be rather hazardous for an outfielder crashing into the wall. When I toured the berm Tuesday, it appeared to me the padding on the wall was plenty sufficient to absorb collisions with players. We'll know for certain when someone plows into the wall to make a catch.

Another question: If fans can now easily lean over the left-field wall, will we see Jeffrey Maier-style interference with deep fly balls? I suspect we might. The fence is 8 feet high, meaning balls will be catchable at the top of the wall, and over it. Will fans show proper restraint? Or reach over to help the home team? I think this will be an issue.

Anyway, the aforementioned first pitch is less than six hours away. It's a beautiful day for baseball. Can't wait.

In case you feared you'd seen the last of Bill Hass' prose, fear not. He will be writing regular columns at the Grasshoppers' Web site, including this "Bill on Baseball" post today. And before the summer's out, you'll be seeing his byline back in the N&R, if on a less frequent basis.

You didn't think Memphis was going to let John Calipari go to Raleigh without a fight did you? Here's the Commercial Appeal's latest update on the Tigers' offer to Cal.

Join the rest of the state of North Carolina then. I'm waiting and wondering - and watching and working phone lines - right alongside you. No news yet from Calipari and Memphis.

But one of the guys on the b-list, former Western Alamance and Elon grad Frank Hait, may have grown tired of waiting for the Wolfpack search committee to get to him. According to the Sun-Sentinel, Haith is close to working out a contract extension and a raise at Miami.

I just got off the phone with Tim Thomas the assistant coach at Patterson Academy, where two Memphis recruits, Pierre Niles and Hashim Bailey attend. Thomas said he got a text message from a Memphis assistant coach letting him know that Calipari and his staff will be remaining in Memphis.

Story coming online shortly ...

Pat Forde has an excellent column up at ESPN.com calling out college basketball coaches on their money-chasing hypocrisy. Seems appropriate after N.C. State AD Lee Fowler threw a pile of cash at Rick Barnes only to see Barnes get a huge raise at Texas and, yesterday, he got turned down by John Calipari when Memphis AD R.C. Johnson scrambled to put together a "show-me-the-money" package for Cal.

Not sure who Fowler turns to next, but expect John Brady to get a nice raise at LSU and Billy Gillispie the same at Texas A&M in the next few days. The coaching arms race -- driven in part by fans who will accept no less than a big name as their coach -- has created some unnatural market forces. As ECU AD Terry Holland said in today's N&O, nothing you can do about it absent collusion, which antitrust laws prevent.

If you're nearly as enthralled by the Sopranos saga on HBO as I am, you'll get a laugh out of SI's Sopranos-sports parallel universe here.

... this relates to other far more serious, huge story coming out of the Triangle.

Charges have finally been brought against two Duke lacrosse players. That means this story has officially entered Lester Munston territory. If you've ever been a regular reader of SI, you know that Munson covers the seamy, ugly underside of the sports world. If you're in serious trouble in sports, Munson's covering your story

All of which means Munson has a lot of experience - unfortunately - with athletes and rape cases. And he shares it in this analysis of the Duke lax indictments.

Fallen Tar Heels coach Matt Doherty has climbed another rung up the ladder, leaving tiny Florida Atlantic in Boca Raton to become head coach at Southern Methodist in Dallas. The hiring was expected to be finalized today.

Doherty, who was 15-13 in his one year at FAU, probably would've been in the mix for some better D-I jobs had his Owls won the A-Sun and pushed a top seed in the NCAA's. Maybe there'd even be serious Doh-to-State talk. OK, maybe not.

As it is, the UNC grad and former coach takes over an SMU program that apparently committed NCAA violations in Jimmy Tubbs' two years as coach -- Mike Dement, now back at UNCG, coached the Mustangs previously.

So, Duke already has its Paulus, a point guard named Greg. Now, John Bunting has tangible proof that his UNC football program is alive and well with a verbal commitment from a younger Paulus, Mike, one of the top-rated high school quarterbacks in the class of '07. I finally managed to get my story posted here.

I heard back from the Pauluses' father, Dave, this morning. "It'll be interesting on Tobacco Road with two Paulus boys down there," he said.

It surely will. Mike, who backed up Greg at QB for two years at Christian Brothers Academy in Syracuse, N.Y., before taking over the position last fall, ultimately chose the Heels over Southern Cal. What this means for North Carolina from a recruiting standpoint was not lost on the family.

"They have a need for a big-time quarterback," Dave Paulus said, "and he can really help their recruiting."

Mike Paulus fully expects to give Cam Sexton, Joe Dailey, or whoever his competition will be, a run for the job as soon as he arrives in Chapel Hill.