Billy King wanted this one. Dead or alive. Four teams, five teams, six teams. Whatever it took.

The 76ers' president/general manager wanted a consistent second scorer - where have we heard that before? - and he wanted some additional size and bulk. In truth, he wanted what he felt he hadn't gotten enough of from Keith Van Horn.

When some voices thought the whole thing was dead and gone, King flatly refused to acknowledge that possibility.

And even as the Sixers acquired forward Glenn Robinson from Atlanta and forward/center Marc Jackson from Minnesota, you got the distinct impression that there could be more coming. Maybe not immediately, but eventually.

"You never know, that's all I'll say, you never know," King said on the telephone from Salt Lake City, where he has been, among other things, monitoring the Rocky Mountain Revue, one of the NBA's sanctioned summer-league venues. "Put it this way, me, Courtney [scout Courtney Witte] and Tony [director of player personnel Tony DiLeo] are still in the room."