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"Hey, how you doing, man," Calipari said. "Still playing well?"

"Not lately," Artest replied, "but I will today."

Soon, it appears, Calipari will be moving to a place where the main form of coaching currency isn't cold cash -- at least in theory -- but rapport with recruits. He will be hunting for future first-round draft choices, chatting them up, wooing them, trying to lure them to, say, Memphis, perhaps?

The Tigers' season could end as early as Wednesday night in the Conference USA Tournament. It might not be long after when Calipari takes over for Memphis interim coach Johnny Jones, ending a lucrative, stormy four-year tenure in the pros and returning to the NCAA.

"In the NBA, you have to be willing to move," Calipari said. "If you stay three, four, five years in one place, you just had a hell of a run. In college, you can stay longer in one place. I have a 13-year-old daughter and a 10-year-old son. I need to be somewhere for six or seven years to get them through high school.

"The one thing about pro basketball, more so than college, if you're not winning and you're not in a great organization, it's the most miserable existence I can tell you. There's nothing more miserable. But if you're winning, you have good guys, a good organization; there's nothing that even comes close to this. Not college. Nothing."

Memphis, 14-15 this season, is the No. 11 seed out of 12 teams in the Conference USA Tournament. But it offers a big salary (reportedly $1 million), fertile recruiting nearby and an admissions policy that won't be unkind to the new dean of hoops. The Tigers are the only game in town, and they have tradition, with Final Four appearances in 1973 and 1985.

"I just want to be somewhere basketball's important, where you can win, where you can compete at the highest level," Calipari said. "The school's committed, the administration is committed to winning at the highest level."

There is no question about Calipari's record for turning around downtrodden teams, although critics point to his team's academic record at Massachusetts and to the NCAA violations of Marcus Camby.

Coaching at UMass from 1988-1996, Calipari lifted the program from virtually nothing to the Sweet 16 in four years. He went to the Final Four in 1996. Moving to the New Jersey Nets -- as details of Camby's trouble began to emerge -- Calipari made it to the playoffs in his second season. He was fired in his third after a 3-17 start.

Memphis seems ready to pay for a big name after unpleasant partings with its previous two coaches.

Jones took over as interim coach in November after Tic Price resigned. Price admitted to an affair with a student and subsequent payments to her of $17,000. Before that, Memphis fired coach Larry Finch in 1997, despite a 220-130 record -- more victories than any coach in school history. But the program had fund-raising and attendance problems.

John Calipari led the Nets to the playoffs in his second season as coach. He was fired in his third.(Allsport)

Now here comes Coach Cal, a poorly kept secret. In February he toured the university and city with athletic director R.C. Johnson.

"My biggest thing is that I didn't want to be a distraction to those seniors and that coaching staff," Calipari said. "The seniors, that's their last run, their last opportunity to be in college. It's become a distraction because it's been printed so much. I went in and saw the school when they were out of town. They didn't even know I got in and out. They really wanted me to see the school. I just tried to stay clear (of the team) and let them do what they have to do."

One of Calipari's biggest fans is Sixers coach Larry Brown. The well-traveled Brown turned down an offer from Memphis in 1979.

"I'd prefer he stay in our league, but whatever happens, I want him to be a head coach," Brown said. "College or pros, he can just coach."

Others haven't been so high on a Calipari, 41. In a memorable postgame blow-up, Temple coach John Chaney once threatened to kill Calipari, the ravenously ambitious new-generation coach who was consistently beating the Owls.

During his time with the Nets, Calipari called a reporter from the Newark Star-Ledger a "Mexican idiot." The NBA fined him $25,000, failing to see the humor in what the coach said was a joke.

Some Nets players said Calipari's screaming style didn't work in the pros, but the coach defended his record at New Jersey.

"We changed the complexion of the whole team," he said. "We changed the whole environment. We had sellouts. We had playoff games. Then we have a bad start and injuries, and I get fired."

He said he isn't looking ahead to vindication as an NBA head coach.

"I wouldn't go into one situation looking into the next," Calipari said. "I've never done that."