Questions about the North Carolina men’s basketball coaching vacancy have become a “pain in the rear end” to 15th-year Kansas University coach Roy Williams.

Yet the questions, which are coming fast and furious from media members, have not, and will not, distract him from the task at hand — preparing for the Final Four — Williams said Wednesday.

“Even with all the junk going on right now, I’m not 99 percent focused on Kansas, I’m 100 percent focused on Kansas. It’s the way it should be,” Williams said before departing to New Orleans, site of Saturday’s 5:07 p.m. national semifinal battle between KU and Marquette at the Superdome.

It took all of five seconds for the media to pepper Williams with questions about fired Carolina coach Matt Doherty and Williams’ possible interest in the UNC job during Wednesday’s Final Four coaches teleconference. Doherty, a KU assistant from 1993-99, resigned under pressure as head coach at UNC Tuesday.

“I was stunned by what went on in Chapel Hill yesterday,” Williams said. “I have talked with Matt several times down the line. My second answer is I don’t think it’s fair (to answer questions about the UNC job).

“I said yesterday, my team, staff, myself, everybody deserves to focus on this Final Four week. Regardless of what I say, the next guy is going to ask another question. Ben Howland is a guy I love to death. Two weeks ago he said Pittsburgh is his ‘destination.’ It’s all a bunch of garbage,” he said of coaches talking about other jobs in the media.

Pitt coach Howland likely will become the next coach at UCLA.

“I think my team deserves me to not have to answer those questions,” Williams said. “I’ve not spent one second thinking about it, except nobody can understand English enough to take an answer.

“I didn’t think this decision would ever come up again,” said Williams, who turned down his alma mater in 2000. “But it has, and it’s already become a pain in the rear end.”

Kansas University coach Roy Williams waves as he boards the team bus. The Jayhawks left Wednesday for New Orleans.

Williams was asked if “ruling it out would eliminate all of the annoyance.”

He said, “Did it rule it out for Ben Howland?”

After the first teleconference questioner continued, Williams said, “I’m finished with this call.”

The second questioner asked if the last 24 hours had been frustrating.

“It’s been extremely frustrating, and I don’t know the best answer,” Williams said. “I really don’t. People want you to say, ‘I’m not interested.’ Well, how the heck do I even know they are even interested in me?’

“These people wanted me to say I was not interested in UCLA, and I never spoke to UCLA’s athletic director. If he sees, ‘Williams turns down UCLA,’ how does it make him feel? He never offered me the job in the first place. My team deserves the right to focus and enjoy this week. It’s how I’ll look at it. If that’s a problem to some people, it’s their problem because it’s what they want to choose.”

• Jayhawks arrive: KU’s team arrived at the New Orleans Sheraton Hotel on Canal Street at 10:40 p.m. Wednesday.

A band played “When the Saints Go Marching In” as the Jayhawks paraded off the bus into the lobby, coach Williams grinning ear-to-ear while wearing Mardi Gras beads.

“I love New Orleans,” Williams said in the hotel lobby. “I love when everything is in walking distance so the kids can see all the pageantry.

“Tomorrow I’ll make a trip to the (Mississippi) River. I don’t know about the kids (Jayhawks),” he said, referring to his morning jog in which he’ll spit in the river for good luck.

Williams did not grow testy when asked about the UNC rumors Wednesday night.

“No, I haven’t,” he said, asked if he had mentioned rumors to the team. “They know I’m with them. It’s you guys. Everybody with a microphone and pen thinks they need to tell me what I need to do. The team understands I am with them.”

The Jayhawks will hold a closed practice today, watch film and “have some free time, too,” Williams said.

Friday, the team will practice at 2:10 p.m. at the Superdome. That practice is open to the public.

• Satisfying season: KU’s coach, who is about to embark on his fourth Final Four, was asked how this trip will compare with last year’s.

“Last year was just fantastic. We hadn’t been in nine years,” Williams said. “That feeling was really special. This year, in some ways, it’s been more satisfying. It was a rockier road for us to the Final Four. I’d describe this as satisfying. Last year was exhilaration. We were so pleased to go after nine years of trying and not making it. That was important.”

Many say KU will win it all this year because the Jayhawks are the only team to return with immediate Final Four experience.

Besides the KU-Marquette matchup, Texas and Syracuse meet in the other semifinal Saturday, with the winners to tangle Monday night.

“The fact we were there last year is a help,” Williams said, “but I don’t think it will be a determining factor in the game. It’s how you play that night.”

• Boeheim wants title, too: Williams is a good buddy of Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim, like Williams a veteran coach who hasn’t won a national title.

“We’ve played golf many times,” Williams said. “We talked this week on a conference call for the NABC (National Assn. of Basketball Coaches). We said if, and it’s a huge if for both of us, if we meet in the final game, at least one guy will leave with some of that load off their shoulders, that kinda thing. He is like me. As long as he can feel good about himself, the job he’s doing and the kids and people at Syracuse feel he’s doing all he can, he’ll feel good regardless. A national championship will not change any of that.”

• Stopping Collison pivotal: KU senior Nick Collison appears on a mission this postseason, a fact that has not escaped Marquette coach Tom Crean’s notice.

“The more film we watch the more I appreciate him,” Crean said. “You sit and watch … he has amazing versatility. He is about as good with his left hand as right. That is a rarity.”

• History buffs: Marquette last reached the Final Four in 1977 when Al McGuire won the national championship and retired.

“Nobody on our team met him,” Crean said of the late McGuire. “How can you not be aware of him living here? (Ex-Marquette) coach Hank Reynolds is around a lot. Our kids appreciate him. They know what (former) coach (Rick) Majerus has done for the program. They have respect for the past.”

• Boeheim on the North Carolina rumors: “I believe Roy will focus on this game. He will not let it change his focus. I know Roy well. He’s a friend, obviously a great basketball coach. He’ll coach this weekend and take care of whatever future after the game is over with.”
• No Holladays: The CNN hookup between KU assistant Joe Holladay and his son, Matt, a U.S. Army paratrooper in Iraq, did not take place Wednesday. Matt Holladay’s unit was on the move, and he was unable to appear on TV.