Is Final Four returning to Atlanta?

Atlanta officials should learn shortly after noon Wednesday whether the city will play host to the NCAA Men’s Final Four basketball championship in a few years.

Nine other cities and metropolitan areas are competing with Atlanta for college basketball’s top game, which Georgia’s capitol last hosted in 2007 at the Georgia Dome.

Atlanta is hoping to snag the bid for 2012, 2013, 2015 or 2016. (Atlanta is not pursuing 2014 because of a large convention that coincides with the tournament dates).

Other hopefuls include Houston, Detroit, Indianapolis, Minneapolis, St. Louis, New Orleans, San Antonio, Phoenix and Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington.

“We are very excited about the possibility of hosting another Men’s NCAA Final Four basketball championship,” said Dome spokeswoman Ashley Boatman, who added that the competing cities are very strong. “We, like everybody else, are looking forward to seeing what (the NCAA) decides.”

Atlanta officials say even though the city just had the competition, fans will find a lot here that is different in four years.

If Atlanta gets the 2012 game, the Georgia Aquarium will have added dolphins to its collection of animals; museums dedicated to health and science as well as civil and human rights will have been erected; and hundreds of new hotel rooms would have been brought on line, William Pate, incoming president of the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau, has said.

The 2012-16 women’s Final Fours will be in Denver; New Orleans; Nashville, Tenn.; Tampa, Fla.; and Indianapolis, the NCAA said last week.

Next year’s men’s competition will be held at Ford Field in Detroit, followed by Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis in 2010 and Reliant Stadium in Houston in 2011.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.