Williams Offers No Clues

Has Roy Williams coached his last game at Kansas?

Williams has deflected rumors all week that he would leave Kansas and return to coach North Carolina and did not offer any new insight after Monday’s national title-game defeat to Syracuse.

“I don’t give a blankety-blank about North Carolina,” Williams said. “I care about those 13 kids in the locker room.”

Despite his public position, Williams figures to be North Carolina’s top candidate to replace Matt Doherty, who resigned recently under fire.

Williams played at North Carolina and spent 10 years as an assistant under Dean Smith.

Williams turned down the job three years ago because he did not want to leave top recruits Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich, who were entering their sophomore seasons.

*

After the game, Williams and Syracuse Coach Jim Boeheim had a brief conversation on the court.

“I said ‘Coach [Bobby] Knight told me 16 years ago that I would be back,’ ” Boeheim said he told Williams.

“He didn’t tell me it would be that long, but he told me I’d be back here. I told Roy that I firmly believe he will win a national championship, without any doubt. There is no doubt in my mind he will win a national championship. He’s got a lot of coaching left in him.”

The spoils of victory?

After the game, Boeheim ran into an old Big East coaching rival. “John Thompson even said, ‘Good game,’ ” Boeheim quipped of the former Georgetown coach. “Twenty years ago that wouldn’t have happened.”

*

Syracuse is the first No. 3-seeded team to win a championship since Michigan in 1989 and the first team seeded lower than No. 1 to win since Kentucky in 1998.... Orangeman guard Gerry McNamara’s six three-point field goals were one shy of the NCAA championship record.

The Jayhawks’ 18 missed free throws match the most in a final and their free-throw percentage of 40% was the worst for a team shooting more than 20 times.