No, John Calipari hasn't watched the tape. He won't ever watch the tape. "If I do, I'd probably cry," he said.

You know the game.

The 2008 men's college basketball national championship game in San Antonio.

Calipari's Memphis Tigers blew a nine-point lead to Kansas in the final two minutes of regulation and lost in overtime.

If star guards Chris Douglas-Roberts and Derrick Rose hadn't missed four of five free throws in the final 1:15 of regulation ...

If maybe Calipari had called a timeout with 10 seconds left and a 63-60 lead to set up his defense ...

If Rose had followed Calipari's instructions to foul Kansas guard Sherron Collins before the Jayhawks' Mario Chalmers made the overtime-forcing 3-point shot ...

"Everything that had to happen for us to lose, happened," Calipari said. "You know when it really hit me? When I was walking off the Alamodome floor and the confetti was coming down on me. I kept thinking, 'We're supposed to be out there. We're supposed to be cutting down the nets.'"

Odds are Calipari won't get so close to a championship again. Certainly, he hasn't spent the past two-plus months feeling sorry for himself. Some people around him did though.

"Would you believe they had food delivered to the house after we got home?" he said. "It was like someone died because we lost a ballgame. It was like being back in Pittsburgh for a funeral and the neighbors send over mac and cheese."

But Calipari wasn't raised to sit around and pout. Not in his blue-collar Moon Township home. There hasn't been any time for that, anyway. Since that painful 75-68 loss, he has, among many other things, signed one of the richest contracts in college basketball, recruited the best guard in the country, taken an all-star team to China and hired an assistant coach from Pitt.

There had been speculation Calipari would leave Memphis for a more prestigious job in a power conference or even the NBA. But the Memphis brass took care of that after the championship game, signing him to an extension through the 2012-13 season at $2.35 million per year. If he stays through the end of the deal, he gets a $5 million bonus.

"I can't say I'll be here for the rest of my life, but I can't see anything in the next five years moving me," Calipari said. "Part of that is financial, but part of it is the commitment from the university. As long as I can see the brass ring out there ... I don't always have to have my arms wrapped around it like I did this year, but I have to be able to see it. I think I'll be able to see it here every year."

Signing 6-foot-6 guard Tyreke Evans -- the 2008 Pennsylvania Player of the Year and the McDonald's All-Star game MVP, out of Philadelphia's American Christian High School -- should help Memphis contend immediately for another Conference USA title.

Evans' arrival comes at the perfect time for Memphis; Rose and Douglas-Roberts are moving on to the NBA. Rose will be the first or second player picked in next week's draft, Douglas-Roberts a later first-round selection.

Asked if Evans might play just one season in college, as Rose did, Calipari said, "I could see that happening. He's the No. 1 pro prospect in his class."

Don't be surprised if Calipari's ties to China don't end up paying off for him in a big way -- literally and figuratively. "No school has a bigger presence in China than Memphis," he said. "Do you believe there are a thousand 7-footers in China?"

You know what he's thinking: Why shouldn't the next Yao Ming play for Memphis?

Earlier this month, Calipari hired former Pitt star and assistant coach Orlando Antigua. "I think he's going to do great here," the boss said. Memphis had two openings to fill after Calipari assistants Derek Kellogg and Chuck Martin got the Massachusetts and Marist head jobs after the championship game.

"As hard as it was to lose that night, a lot of positives came out of our season," Calipari said. "We won the most games in the history of college basketball (38), a record I'm not sure ever will be broken. Two of my assistants got head jobs. Three lower-level assistants were promoted to better jobs. Five of my players are going to the NBA. Applications to the university have gone way up. Test scores have gone up. The money that was generated for this university and city has been unbelievable.

"It was so huge for Memphis. I'm just disappointed we couldn't bring it home for the city. Pittsburgh sees itself as a championship city. Memphis doesn't. It would have been nice to have been able to give them that feeling."

There was one other positive to come out of the Tigers' marvelous run.

It's hard to believe Calipari forgot to mention it.

The mac and cheese was delicious.