NEW ORLEANS - Roy Williams has grown tired of the North Carolina questions. When someone suggested to the Kansas coach that he could have killed the Carolina speculation simply by saying he wasn't interested in the Tar Heels job, Williams became indignant.

"Before you make every decision in your life, you ought to think about it," Williams said. "By God, I'm not going to think one second that's going to take me away from Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich. Whether it's media, college presidents or anybody in the world. If they have a tough time with that, that's their problem. By God, I am not going to cheat Kirk Hinrich. I'm not going to cheat Nick Collison."

By God, the self-importance just got knee-deep at the Final Four. Somebody get me my waders.

It's impossible to feel any empathy for Williams, who would be moving from one seven-figure job to another. The only thing that would fundamentally change for Roy is his country club membership.

A few hundred feet down the hall, in the caverns of the Superdome, Dwyane Wade had a real dilemma. "College basketball is the best basketball. I'm just happy to be a part of it. School's great. With the teammates I have, any decision I make will be hard," he said.

Wade is a Marquette junior and the best player at the Final Four. In a tournament of stars - Kansas seniors Hinrich and Collison, Syracuse freshman Carmelo Anthony, Texas point guard T.J. Ford - Wade is a virtuoso. Nobody can guard him. "He can make a play when it doesn't look like one can be made" was how his coach, Tom Crean, put it.

The best players own an innate creativity. It's an artistry that has nothing to do with their leaps and everything to do with their imaginations. They make it up on the fly. They make it up while they fly.

Wade had a triple-double against Kentucky in the regional final last week. The game before that, he had 20 against Pitt, in the second half. In the last 10 days, he has made himself a lot of money.

If that's what he wants to do.

He says he doesn't know what he wants. Everybody has an answer for him.

"He'd be crazy to turn pro. Money can't love you back," Utah coach Rick Majerus said Friday.

Darn right.

"He doesn't need (a degree) to play pro basketball. When he needs it, he'll come back and get it," said Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim.

Absolutely correct.

The notion that Wade is even thinking of returning for a senior season qualifies him for student of the year. When we quit pounding the student-athlete hypocrisy rock, we discover people like Dwyane Wade, whose pot of gold is as close as the NBA draft. Why should he wait another year to grab it?

Selfishly, you want Wade to stay. You love college basketball, you think the NBA is for mercenaries and bad boys. How would UC have been this year with DerMarr Johnson and Kenny Satterfield? Xavier, without David West?

But that's not realistic, and it's not fair. It's imposing your middle-class values on someone who might not share them. Schools recruit athletes to be athletes, not to be students. The sooner we accept that, the better off we'll be.

Should Wade leave? Of course he should. Tonight, if Marquette loses. Wade wouldn't be leaving for the usual reasons, because of an expensive car or nice clothes or blinding jewelry, or because all the "friends" hoping to hitch a ride to his wallet are telling him to.

He has a wife and a 14-month-old son.

They live a block from campus, in a small apartment. Teammate Scott Merritt says Wade shows up to class "with family pictures falling out of his notebook." Somehow, this 21-year-old has time to be a father, a husband, an All-American and a 3.0 student. Getting an NBA job would ease every burden.

He should go and nobody should say anything but thanks and good luck. Big-time college basketball isn't just about sports, any more than getting an engineering degree is just about a "well-rounded liberal arts education." It's job training.

The late, great Marquette coach Al McGuire once was asked why he advised center Jim Chones to leave school early for the riches of the pros. "I looked in Jim's refrigerator and I looked in my refrigerator," McGuire said.

As for Roy Williams: He'll have a full refrigerator wherever he lands. By God.

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E-mail pdaugherty@enquirer.com