George Mason went from Final Four to the Final 64.

Seniors Will Thomas and Folarin Campbell ended their careers without another NCAA Tournament run, they'll be remembered at GMU forever.

The Patriots, preseason selections to win the Colonial Athletic Association championship, spent the entire season chasing VCU and, when the regular season ended with something of a swoon, losing four its last seven games, it appeared they had blown their chance to advance to the Dance.

Ah, but there is a matter of the conference championship and calling upon the experience and leadership of their Final Four holdovers -- Thomas and Campbell -- they swept through the field, avoided having to play VCU and won the title.

In the end, the goal was the same as when the season started: to get to the NCAA Tournament, to recapture some of the magic of 2006, and had they drawn someone other than the Big East's highest scoring team, Notre Dame, they might have been able to play their way deeper into the tournament.

And so the last chapter was written on the careers of Thomas and Campbell.

"I didn't really appreciate it until today," said senior point guard Folarin Campbell. "Every team in the NCAA tournament is a great team. Just to know what we did two years ago, I look back at that and just see how remarkable that run was."

Thomas leaves as only the seventh player in school history to average a double-double for a season, as the all-time leader in games played, games started and minutes played. He is third all-time in the CAA in career field-goal percentage at 61.4.

Campbell is the only player in school history to tally 500 points, 400 rebounds, 300 assists, 150 3-pointers, 100 steals and 50 blocks. And when needed in his senior year he was there, scoring 15 or more points in the season's final 16 games leading into the NCAA and averaging 20 points, 4.6 rebounds and 3.6 assists.

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