This time, he was not sure.

That is why when the name "Villanova" popped up on the screen relatively early, paired against Clemson in a first-round game Friday at 9:50 p.m. in Tampa, Fla., the Villanova coach felt an intense sense of joy as he jumped up on a seat in the Wildcats' small auditorium at the Davis Center. He also felt profound relief.

"I don't want to go through this again," Wright said last night, minutes after getting the news, "but I'll tell you what, it was exciting.

"We went crazy. Someone asked me, 'Where are we going?' I didn't know where we were going. Nobody even cared. I didn't really know who we were playing at first. But it was cool. It was really exciting, really thrilling. You don't get many of those experiences in life."

The Wildcats (20-12) will enter the Midwest Regional as a No. 12 seed, which made them the last team among the 34 at-large selections to make the field. Every other 12th seed - Temple, George Mason and Western Kentucky - had won an automatic bid.

Wright said all of his players were jumping up and down with the exception of junior cocaptain Dante Cunningham, who was slumped in his seat "because I think he invested the most of anybody" in leading the team to rebound from a five-game midseason losing streak that almost cost the Wildcats a chance at the NCAAs.

"He was the first junior to step up and say, 'Look, we've got to take control. It's time for us to take control. It's not the coaches,' " Wright said. "It's just so gratifying for me to see them learn this lesson. I couldn't have a better feeling."

Cunningham said that since the Wildcats lost Thursday to Georgetown in the Big East tournament quarterfinals, it was just a matter of staying optimistic.

"Of course you hope for the best," he said. "But we put our resume out there and we just went for it."

Yes, the resume. The Wildcats had three wins over top-50 teams in the Ratings Percentage Index until Saturday night, when Temple's win over St. Joseph's in the Atlantic Ten title game moved the Owls into that bracket, giving Villanova four quality wins.

In the end, the selection committee considered victories over Connecticut, Pittsburgh and West Virginia and a 7-4 mark down the stretch to cancel out losses to Rutgers and DePaul. Plus, as Wright pointed out, the Wildcats defeated the champions of the A-10 (Temple), Big East (Pitt) and Colonial (George Mason).

"I think our schedule was a lot tougher than people gave it credit for early," Wright said. "That's one of the things you always have to take into account. You never really know how good your schedule was until the end of the year when you see what everybody does. It's also respect for the Big East."

Clemson, which lost to No. 1 North Carolina in the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament championship game, was selected as a No. 5 seed. Wright said he knew a little about the Tigers, especially guard K.C. Rivers and forward James Mays, but added that his players "were telling me all about them."

Preparations for the Tigers begin today, but the Wildcats are thrilled to be part of the big show.

"Coach always says you can't control things on the outside," guard Scottie Reynolds said. "We tried to take care of business and we put our resume out there. It just worked out for us and we're thankful for the opportunity."