Jay Williams thought he was done for the night. He'd deftly handled an hour of questions, starting with TNT's on-air interview, then ESPN Radio and the media room. He even managed to sound excited to be playing for Jerry Krause.

When he wrapped up an online chat session for NBA.com, he was gnawing on complimentary gummy worms and prepping for a serious wind-down session. "I'm done for the night," he said. "Time to celebrate now."

Not so fast, Jay. Still chomping on the worms, Williams forgot he had to answer the toughest question of the night: Got Milk? Williams and two other avid milk guzzlers, Kansas' Drew Gooden and Maryland's Chris Wilcox, had volunteered to shoot promos for the NBA's Got Milk? station at Madison Square Garden.

The premise, to talk about the thrill of draft night and find some way to throw in a plug for milk, seemed so simple, too.

It wasn't.

Williams' opening statement on milk, a paragraph about how important milk had been in him getting to the NBA, took six takes. He answered a few more broad questions ("What do you want to say to all of your fans back at Duke and now in Chicago … and … uh … fit milk in there somewhere?"), then finished with a direct shout-out.

"Thank you to milk," he said. "You've helped me become as strong a person as possible. Hopefully, I'll keep drinking you and keep getting stronger."

Gooden was next. He wanted to keep things nice and simple, but he went a little over-the-top.

"So Drew, what's the first thing you're gonna do when you get to Memphis?"

"Milk -- I'm gonna drink milk."

The milk crew director wanted him to spice it up a little, so he offered this: "To all the people in Memphis, look out. When I get there, I'm gonna have some ribs and milk."

Gooden kept a straight face for about half a second, then broke down. "Nah, man, that's corny," he laughed. But his closing line, "Everybody in Memphis, put your milk on ice, because here I come," caught on.

When Wilcox wandered in 10 minutes later, he opened with a much stiffer rendition. The second try wasn't much better -- but hey, the kid's 19. Hard to go from pitching dorm-room spitballs to pitching products overnight.

He landed a solid finish ("Now that I'm in the NBA, I'll continue to make milk," as he raised an enormous index finger, "my No. 1"), then wiped a sweat puddle off his forehead.

"Whew," he said. "That was tougher than I thought."

Then he meandered off to do an NBA TV interview before he wound down in a players lounge, where draftees could call their new team and start talking multi-million dollar contracts.

Nothing like a little milk money.

Ryan Hockensmith is a frequent contributor to ESPN The Magazine.