Like many notable writers -- particularly legends William Faulkner, Willie Morris and, well, colleague Gregg Doyel -- Gary Parrish was raised in Mississippi, where he has never hunted, rarely fished but many times taken part in backyard barbeques, even ones that involved another celebrated Magnolia State hack, some guy named John Grisham.

(Gary's parents graduated high school with Grisham. His mother claims to have helped write the author's senior paper, which we trust was better than The Client, if not as lucrative.)

Parrish joins CBSSports.com as its college basketball columnist after spending seven years at The Memphis Commercial Appeal.

There, he covered John Calipari and the University of Memphis for five seasons, but is probably best known as the writer who exposed the "Albert Means Recruiting Scandal" that placed the Alabama football program on probation and made Logan Young the first booster in NCAA history to be sentenced to prison for buying a prospect. Parrish garnered several accolades for that work, including two prestigious Associated Press Sports Editors awards.

On a personal level, Parrish enjoys honey mustard, flip-flops and rooms lit only by lamps, and he believes he is the best online poker player he knows. Among some dislikes are black olives, yard work, going to bed before Letterman and people who slow-play pocket aces.

Parrish resides in the Memphis-area, where he lives with his lovely wife (Kelly), angry dog (Mickey) and always-up-to-something son (Aiden), the latter of whom is still much too young to grasp the complexities of basketball, yet swears to his father that the best players on the planet are Shaquille O'Neal and Rodney Carney, though not necessarily in that order.