FINAL FOUR BRINGS A STATE OF EUPHORIA.

Byline: STEVE DILBECK

INDIANAPOLIS - Been here a few hours now and have yet to see Bobby Knight scream at a single bell boy. Walked onto the basketball floor of the RCA Dome and Gene Hackman was not instructing players to measure the height of the basket.

Strolled through downtown streets and did not stumble upon a lone pickup game. No one was wearing old-fashioned basketball shorts. Did not meet a single person named Jimmy Chitwood, Bobby Plump or Shooter.

Here in America's heartland, where basketball is less a simple game than way of life, the Final Four is once again setting up the hardwood in downtown Indianapolis.

Truth be told: In my lengthy and illustrious sports writing career, this is my first Final Four.

``If you only go once, it should be in Indiana,'' said several ink-stained peers.

They say Indiana almost in hushed tones, as if it's understood this is the holy place of all things basketball, that you just can't say Indiana as if talking about the game being played in Montana or Mississippi or Slovenia.

This is the state that gave us John Wooden, Oscar Robertson and Larry Bird. And, it should be fairly noted, that great statesman Dan Quayle.

Indiana takes its basketball more seriously than a Hollywood actress her plastic surgeon. You're supposed to get it right here.

It made prep basketball near religion; 19 of the 20 largest high school gyms in America are in Indiana. Win a state title here, and it's a lifetime of acclaim and hero worship.

Yep, just flat out excited to be at my first Final Four and in that mecca of hoops, Indiana.

Not that Indiana is exactly cresting on its current wave of basketball lore.

The state prep tournament, once the most admired in the nation, has hit upon hard times since it switched to four divisional champions.

When there was a single overall winner for the state title, and the smallest of schools had to take on the Goliaths, it evoked adoration, praise and envy, and sparked the legendary film ``Hoosiers.''

Now it's just another state tournament, and attendance is shrinking.

Indiana University hasn't won a national title since 1987. It fired Knight, drove out Mike Davis last month and then went outside the state to hire his replacement, Oklahoma's Kelvin Sampson.

This was mostly greeted with a colossal Hoosier yawn, if not plain puzzlement. Wrote Indianapolis Star sports columnist Bob Kravitz: ``Is this the best IU could do?''

Apparently so.

Sampson had the temerity to stand beneath Indiana's five NCAA championship banners Wednesday and decree, however factual: ``I'm a Hoosier now.''

And then there are the Indiana Pacers, who have never won an NBA title, are currently in post-Ron Artest disarray and laboring at .500. Where have you gone, Reggie Miller?

But here in Indianapolis, which was apparently dubbed ``Crossroads of America'' prior to the Louisiana Purchase, the Final Four brings a fresh, if momentary, return to hoop glory.

There may not be a single soul in the entire state who knows what a Hoosier is, but they tend to get a tad excited when the NCAA's greatest spectacle comes back to town.

They treat this like it's a tryout for the Olympic Games. The airport, downtown hotels and streets are teeming with blue-shirted volunteers. And they're all so darned happy.

They constantly ask if they can help. Ask one of the many airport volunteers where the Final Four shuttle is and they don't point you to it, they walk you to it. Enter your hotel and someone walks you to the registration desk. Maybe they're just all really lonely.

Mention to the volunteer on the bus you have to return to the airport in three hours to pick up your luggage, and she's on her cell and in moments announcing: ``We'll have a car pick you up in front of your hotel.''

Thought about mentioning my back was killing me after the long flight and could really use an expert masseuse, but decided not to push it.

They're always smiling. It's starting to become annoying.

The big event itself is at the RCA Dome, which is not a basketball arena at all but home to the NFL's Indianapolis Colts. If anyone has ever been to the Metrodome in Minneapolis, and all my sympathies, just imagine that on steroids.

The former Hoosier Dome is actually part of the downtown convention center. It has skywalks that connect to seven downtown hotels. Naturally, got lost the first time I entered this mini-city. It has over 400,000 square feet, most of which is crawling with coaches trying to move up.

The basketball floor seems dwarfed inside the 58,000-seat football stadium. About the only basketball game easy to imagine being played here is UCLA-Houston in the Astrodome circa 1968.

It's been an absolutely marvelous tournament thus far, so you have to give the good Midwest people of Indiana opportunity to get the finish right.

All traditional Indiana signs might not be there, but here's hoping they pull it off. Betting on it, actually, that and Jimmy Chitwood at the buzzer.