4
The
Superspotlight module offers some intersting features to highlight several stories from your news etc.
How and if you use this is up to you, it's only an idea. Looking at the sample site you gave, you ned to maximise your use of center_right and center_left blocks in order to get the divide in the page content.
This will probably take some experimenting with in order to get sizing correct.
You also need to choose a theme that demonstrates how to use a tabbed header, if you want to persue that idea. Many themes use tabs, so have a good look in the library.
For certain you will need to adjust and build on any base theme to get just the right functions and look.