What's the best way to emulate this website?

Hi,

I’d like to emulate the website, https://www.aslnetwork.com, and I already bought Thesis. But with Thesis, it seems like you still have to know a fair amount of coding. The I found Platform Pro by Pagelines.com, and that seems to be pretty sweet. Drag and drop vs. coding. I also have the Fresh News theme from Woo Themes.

My question is, can I use Fresh News to emulate this site? Am I able to have the sidebars appear only on certain pages?

If not, then am I correct in stating that you really need to know coding to use Thesis?

Has anyone used Platform Pro? Would it be pretty easy to emulate that site with it?

Would love to know ASAP, as there is a rush on this project.

Thanks!