News and notes surrounding the search for the next MSU coach:

• MSU men's basketball head coach Tom Izzo said this week he didn't think his friend, former Detroit Lions coach Steve Mariucci, will be a candidate. Last week, Mariucci's agent told Adam Schefter, an NFL analyst for www.nfl.com, that Mariucci was not interested in leaving his current job as an analyst for the NFL Network.

• Roger Brown, a columnist with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, Ohio, wrote last week: "Look for Browns defensive coordinator Todd Grantham to become the No. 1 candidate for Michigan State's head coaching job." Grantham was an MSU assistant coach from 1996 to 1998 under Nick Saban, who is now with the Miami Dolphins.

• Now that George Perles got elected to the MSU Board of Trustees on Tuesday, will he make a push to bring in Pat Shurmur? Shurmur, the current quarterbacks coach with the Philadelphia Eagles, worked as a graduate assistant under Perles' head coaching reign from the late '80s until the early '90s.

• The Winston-Salem Journal, citing an anonymous source, reported on its Web site Wednesday that former Cleveland Browns coach Butch Davis had signed a contract with North Carolina. Davis' agent said Wednesday evening that nothing had been finalized.

• The Iowa City Press Citizen named John L. Smith as a candidate for the head coaching job at Iowa State. The list includes Texas defensive coordinator Gene Chizik, Texas-El Paso coach Mike Price and LSU defensive coordinator Bo Pelini. Chizik's name also has circulated for the MSU job. Dan McCarney, the Big 12's longest tenured coach, will step down as head coach following the season.