Washington, D.C. — It's official. The Georgia Bulldogs are in the NCAA Tournament.

Technically, they were as soon as the game clock ticked down in the SEC Tournament championship in Atlanta last Sunday. But it became real for the coaches and players Wednesday morning when they were asked to step up to the microphone on a stage in front of a media throng at the Verizon Center.

The Bulldogs were the first up of the eight teams here in the Washington Regional to meet the press and Georgia captains Sundiata Gaines and Dave Bliss were the first to represent their school. Their general message: We're happy to be here but we don't plan to leave anytime soon.

"We feel good," pronounced Bliss, the Bulldogs' big senior center. "We're still kind of riding the emotion of last week. Practices have been real upbeat. I just hope we can recover from playing those four games in three days."

A lot of the questions directed to Gaines were about him being from New York and having a lot of family in the area. He figures he'll have at least 20 family and friends at the game.

"They tried to get us a game for me in New York but that didn't work out," Gaines said. "But I'll take the NCAA Tournament over that."

Georgia coach Dennis Felton was up separately after the players and was peppered with questions about how the Dogs did what they did in Atlanta and about what their inspiration was. Felton said it had more to do with his two seniors than him.

"If they don't sit down and talk to their teammates on their terms about what they expected, then we probably don't win the championship."

At 12:15 p.m. the Bulldogs took the court at the Verizon Center for their first practice in D.C. It was an open practice, with a couple hundred fans in the stands, and ended up being more of a shoot-around than anything.

The Bulldogs are clearly loose and ready for more.

"We feel like we have nothing to lose," Bliss said.