North Carolina’s Roy Williams is too smart to try to be a pro basketball coach. So is Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski. Billy Donovan looks a lot smarter after taking the Orlando Magic job, then retreating to his comfort zone at Florida.

College basketball entails massive commitment, ungodly hours, constant schmoozing with boosters, parents and fans, unbelievable travel, lining up players, getting them and keeping them happy, or just keeping them. Academic considerations are vital, dealing with administrators is not always easy and you’re on call 24-7. Sometimes you get to coach.

But when you have long-term $2 million-plus packages such as Williams, Krzyzewski and Kansas’s Bill Self have, and the $3.5 million bundle Donovan got, you can take a lot of roughing-up if your family’s happy.

Pro coaches can make incredible money, like the $6 million Donovan was due to get at Orlando. That can build a nifty retirement portfolio. You don’t have to go into homes, coddle kids you don’t really like and deal with hovering helicopter parents. The pro season is long, but there are breaks and you associate with a lot of celebrities, good and bad. But “coaching?”

The late Al McGuire put it best: “I’m never coaching any pro team where I don’t make at least $1 more a year than my highest-paid player.” So Billy Donovan would make $6 million. How does he keep some $10 million malcontent out of jail, playing his brand of basketball? Hucksters like Red Auerbach, Phil Jackson, John Kundla and Pat Riley with all their title rings figured out ways to orchestrate superstars; college dropouts like Rick Pitino, P.J. Carlesimo and Tim Floyd never could.

There were lots of predictions Donovan would break such a mold and become only the second guy since Larry Brown to annex both college and NBA titles. I doubt that. Billy sensed it quickly and figured that for all its frailties, and less money, college ball is more his bag. Too, $3.5 million is not poverty level.

Just imagine control freak Roy Williams with his insistence on conformity tutoring a Dennis Rodman or Allen Iverson, or trying to. Suppose he and Michael Jordan as a player, for all Mike’s Carolina loyalty, clashed and Roy was getting $10 million and Mike $20 mil. If pressure creates dizzy spells for Williams in college, how long before he’d be stretcher-ready as a pro boss and wind up in a graveyard gabardine?

So if the time comes, and it might with R.C. Buford as the San Antonio Spurs general manager, will KU’s Self buck history or decide he’s better off fulfilling his lucrative five-year deal at KU, with an extension? Former KU assistant Buford and Self are close friends, respect each other greatly. Gregg Popovich, about to win his fourth title ring as Spurs coach, might decide he’s done all he can do.

Or suppose one of the NBA teams shifted to Kansas City or Oklahoma City and the owners wanted the brightest GM on the planet, R.C. Buford. Guess whom R.C. might call first to fill the coaching job.

Self and athletic director Lew Perkins seem to get along well, which Perkins badly needs since Bill and his program are the most redeeming feature at KU right now. Yet what if Lew reaches June of 2009, rakes off that $1.3 million tax-free bonus he gets then, along with the $650,000 annual wage he’s been making, and takes off? By then would Self be ready to consider joining Buford in the pros?

I doubt it, because Bill’s as smart as Roy, Mike and Donovan. But, oh, how things can change in a couple of years, even one.