The Magazine's Andy Latack sped off to Nassau Coliseum to see some Crusaders' prayers go unanswered. He sent this e-mail from an emotional postgame locker room.

You gotta hand it to 'em. The kids from Holy Cross put on a good front. By the time I got in the locker room, the Crusaders' eyes were as dry as a physics term paper. But if you looked closely, the carpet was not.

"I gotta be honest, man," freshman guard Jave Meade told me with a sly smile. "We wiped a few tears away before y'all came in."

Understandable. Holy Cross scared the holy crap out of Kentucky. And for a team that finished last in the Patriot League last year ... a team that was given about as much chance to win as Ralph Nader ... a team that was tied with Kentucky with six minutes to play...well, the postgame locker room was too much of a circus to be a funeral.

"The Holy Cross locker room is now open!"

It was like the starter's pistol at a race, and immediately the Crusaders' domain was flooded with a press corps roughly as large as the school's student body. Reserves who made the mistake of showering early found their lockers barricaded by interviewers when they returned in towels. Most shrugged, adjusted said towels and took a seat on the outskirts. When the locker room first opened, forward Dekker McKeever -- on crutches and out for the season with a broken foot -- eyed the oncoming stampede and gulped. He barely maneuvered himself to the safety of the corner.

SIDs snapped pictures of seniors Josh Sankes and Jared Curry talking to more reporters than they had all season. A record must have been set for number of post-loss congratulations.

And with good reason. Ralph Willard's boys had worked for years to get noticed -- and in the end, it only took 40 minutes. Despite losing, this was simply too big of an occasion to spend the aftermath moping. "Hey, my dad rented a stretch limo for the day," Sankes laughed, not looking like a kid at the end of his collegiate career. He pulled his jersey off to reveal an undershirt so yellowed I'm guessing it had been his 'game shirt' since high school. "I'm gonna go out on the town."

Since we're in Uniondale, I'm hoping 'town' means he's making the drive down the LIE to NYC.

Andy Latack covers college hoop for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at andylatack@espnmag.com.