“They had a lot of bodies and a lot of athletic guys who could chase me,” Curry said. “They did make me work hard, and I had good looks at the end, but they weren’t falling like they did all tournament. We can’t hang our heads. We had opportunities. We just didn’t execute.”

Indeed, the Wildcats (29-3) have nothing to be ashamed of.

They hung with the toughest teams in the nation — Georgetown and Wisconsin had two of the stingiest defenses in the country — and gave little Davidson something to be known for besides providing free laundry to its students. The Wildcats left the floor to applause from a fan club that’s gotten a lot bigger over the last two weeks, and Max Paulhus Gosselin acknowledged them by holding up his index finger.

“This is about as tough a loss as it can get,” Gosselin said. “We all played as hard as we could for the whole duration of the game. Now it’s over.”

For the Kansas’ Jayhawks, it’s just starting.

This is their 13th trip to the Final Four, but first since 2003 — Williams’ final season. He took the Jayhawks to the championship game — they lost to Syracuse — then bolted for his alma mater.

“Everyone knows he used to coach for KU,” Collins said. “There will be a lot of emotion and a lot of heat for that game.”

Emotions for Self, too. He had taken teams from three different schools to the regional finals only to fall short four times, including last year’s loss to UCLA, and he acknowledged Saturday that the hole in his resume weighed on him daily.

Slide show   Week in Sports Pictures Flying on the hardwood, racing on the rink, getting physical on the gridiron, and much more. more photos

No longer. He smiled and gave a thumbs-up to the Kansas fans who shouted his name, and the players beamed as they lined up to cut down the nets at Ford Field. And when he came to the post-game news conference, he’d traded his snazzy suit for boring old warmups because his players had doused him with water.

“I don’t know how I’ll feel, but I think we should have a great week,” Self said. “The hard part is just beginning, but in our guys and minds, there’s been a weight that has been lifted, which should free us up a little bit.”

For the Davidson Wildcats, they are left to wonder about “what if.”

“We expected to win,” McKillop said. “We didn’t come here content or satisfied. We expected to win. This has been a 12-month mission. It came down to one final play. That’s the beauty of this game that we play.”

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