As the final seconds ticked off the clock in Cincinnati's double-overtime loss to UCLA in the NCAA Tournament, Joe Dowd took a long sip of his beer at Willie's Sports Cafe in Covington and said flatly: “This sucks.”

        That summed up the sentiments at the Dana Center in Evanston of Xavier fans, who also swallowed a large dose of disappointment as the Musketeers lost their second-round game against Oklahoma a few hours later.

        “We had a chance, but we blew it,” said 22-year-old Xavier alumnus Brandon Hughes, surrounded by brooding buddies as he hunched over his beer at the crowded Dana Center bar.

        The significance of the games made the losses even harder to take for many fans.

        If Cincinnati and Xavier had won, both would have advanced to the Sweet 16 — a feat the two teams haven't accomplished in the same year in more than a decade.

        A Cincinnati victory would have been especially sweet for Bearcats fans, whose team was one of only a handful in NCAA history to begin the season ranked outside the Top 25 and then go on to claim a No. 1 seed in the tournament.

        When the Bearcats jumped out to an 11-0 run to start the game, Darrel Williams jumped from his bar stool at Willie's and began leading the cheers for a UC squad he believed was underrated.

        “Everybody thought UC was going to be a pushover, but they came to play,” the 30-year-old Devou Park resident said with a raised fist and a smile.

        Mr. Williams' smile turned to an apprehensive frown as UCLA began to rally in the second half.

        But a steal and a dunk by Immanuel McElroy with 9:20 left in regulation put the Bearcats up 65-54 and sent shouts of “Yes!” reverberating through the bar.

        A small group of fans, donning green hats and makeup for St. Patrick's Day, even began singing “Do you know the way to San Jose?”

        That's where the winner of the UC game would play Missouri in the West Regional semifinal game.

        “They can do it,” said 24-year-old Amy Merritt of West Chester. “They might not have as much talent as they've had in the past, but they've got a lot more heart and drive.”

        Unfortunately for the Bearcats, that drive couldn't stop the Bruins from outscoring Cincinnati 15-11 in the second overtime, keeping UC from the round of 16 for the fifth time in six years.

        “Unbelievable,” Mr. Dowd, a former UC student, said after the game. “Who would have thought Leonard Stokes could have 39 points (a career high) and UC would lose? The rest of the team just didn't step up when they needed to step up.”

        Xavier, which had won seven games in a row and was 21-2 since starting 5-3, didn't keep its fans in suspense as long as UC.

        But they put up a good fight, tying the score several times on big shots, sending suds flying through the air at the Dana Center, a cozy college pub on Dana Avenue whose hardwood floors were soaked with beer by the end of the game.

        “They call it March Madness for good reason, these games will drive you crazy,” said James Ellroy, a former Xavier student, who said he couldn't sit down because he was “too nervous.”

        Although Mr. Ellroy acknowledged that Xavier probably had less of a chance to win than UC, he was confident the Musketeers could pull out a win.

        “They got off to kind of a shaky start, but they're starting to calm down,” he said. “They gotta stop turing the ball over, though.”

        Mr. Ellroy clenched so hard a green glow-stick hoop he was carrying to celebrate St. Patrick's Day that he broke it in half when Oklahoma began to pull away with about 11 minutes left in the second half.

        “They hit some big shots, and we missed too many free throws down the stretch,” he said. “Yeah, I'm disappointed. But I'm proud of the season we had.”

        Ryan Day, a 2001 Xavier graduate, echoed those sentiments: “I think we showed what we were made of. I would have been ecstatic if we won, but ... ”

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