Sammy Hernandez transferred to Florida Atlantic after his sophomore season and settled in his native Miami where he does, in his words, “a little bit of everything.” He runs his own youth basketball organization, coaches kids and and works at basketball camps for the Miami-Dade recreation department. He regularly attends Miami games in support of Jim Larranaga. Patrick Mazur spent three years as George Mason’s mascot, Gunston, culminating in the Final Four. He now lives in Philadelphia and works in sales for IBM. The Final Four run remains among his most memorable experiences: “I don’t go a week without it coming up in some way in my life,” he said. Five members of the 2005-06 team played in the NBA, including four-time all-star Al Horford and two-time all-star Joakim Noah. Tom O’Connor retired from George Mason in 2015 after spending 20 years at the school, becoming the Washington area’s longest-tenured Division I athletic director. He soon began consulting for other programs, and agreed in December to serve as the interim athletic director at Manhattan College through this spring. Tim Burns and his brother launched for-profit and nonprofit organizations offering basketball training in Manhattan, working with players from grade school through the pros. Their groups have formed a partnership with the District of Attorney of Manhattan, and have done NBA pre-draft training for the past four years. Gabe Norwood began playing professionally in the Philippines after leaving Mason, becoming a six-time all-star and joining the Filipino national team for a handful of international competitions. He now spends 10 months of the year in the Philippines and plays for the Rain or Shine Elasto Painters. The Final Four run, he said, is “brought up probably at least once a week, even out here in Manila.” Norwood traveled to the Super Bowl this year to support his brother, Broncos wide receiver Jordan Norwood. Scott Cherry left George Mason a year after the Final Four run, becoming an assistant coach at Western Kentucky and then South Carolina before being named High Point’s head coach in 2009. Cherry remains at the North Carolina school, having led the Panthers to their first Division I postseason appearance, their first Big South Conference regular season title, and their first NIT berth. They were the No. 1 seed in this season’s Big South tournament, which started Friday. Jim Larranaga turned down overtures from power-conference schools, including alma mater Providence, for several years after George Mason’s Final Four run until he left for Miami following the 2011-12 season. Larranaga has resurrected a dormant program, winning 29 games in his second season and reaching No. 7 in the country this year. “John Feinstein told [wife] Liz and I at breakfast one morning that our life would never be the same” after the Final Four, Larranaga said. “I responded and said, ‘We’re not going to change at all.’ He said, ‘You don’t have to. Your circumstances will change dramatically.’ " Alan Merten retired as George Mason’s president in 2012 after 16 years, having transformed the school into Virginia’s largest public university. He now serves on corporate boards and spends most of his time in Florida, although he maintains a residence in Arlington. James Johnson moved to Virginia Tech as an assistant in 2007, became the head coach of the Hokies for two seasons and rejoined Jim Larranaga in Miami for this season as Miami’s director of basketball operations. Chris Caputo is in his fifth season as an assistant coach at Miami, his 14th year serving under Larranaga. Jai Lewis had a brief dalliance with the NFL, signing with the New York Giants as an undrafted free agent and prospective offensive tackle. He played basketball overseas for eight years, mostly in Japan, France and Philippines. For the past two years, he has worked as a behavior interventionist at Halstead Academy in Baltimore. “I like dealing with kids,” Lewis said. “You never know what they’re going to say. They always make you laugh and smile.” Lamar Butler played professionally for five seasons, making stops in the Czech Republic, Turkey and the NBA D-League. He now serves at as an assistant coach for St. John’s College High School in the District. “I talked to Tim [Burns] maybe two weeks ago,” Butler said. “I talk to Tony [Skinn] it seems like every week. I talk to Folarin [Campbell] and [John Vaughn]. We’re Madden enemies. We get on the PlayStation, talk on the chat. I texted Jai [Lewis] maybe two weeks ago. Of course, Coach L. I saw him this past weekend. We all still communicate.”

ASST. COACH CHRIS CAPUTO: The first night we get in there, we take the team to St. Elmo’s, a great steakhouse in Indianapolis. We get this room in the basement, and (Billy) Packer and (Jim) Nantz are upstairs eating. It might have been Tom O’Connor or Coach who asked them to come down and talk to the team. It was funny. Jim Nantz couldn’t have been nicer and hat-in-hand, sort of apologetic. And Packer, he wasn’t going to apologize. He was cracking some jokes. The funny thing, the guys didn’t want any part of it. They were looking at their plates. It was personal to them.

LARRANAGA: CBS was there, and they were filming our dinner. My wife was sitting next to me. She’s very frugal. All the players were ordering lobster tails. She said to me, “Would it be too much to order a lobster tail?” And I said, “No, you’re on full scholarship this weekend.” She said, “Thank goodness. I’ve been a walk-on for 35 years.”

MAZUR: You’re going up against a UCLA Bruin, a Florida Alligator and an LSU Tiger. Everyone knows that. And then all of a sudden here comes a green thing, and no one knows what it is. People would say, “What are you?” And my mascot reaction was always to shrug my shoulders and hold my hands up in the air.

JUNIOR GUARD GABE NORWOOD: To come out and see more people at our practice than we had all season at any of our regular season games was one of those moments where it’s like, “Man, this is really history.”

SENIOR GUARD LAMAR BUTLER: Before the game, we even talked about it as a team: Whoever wins our game is going to win the national championship. We watched UCLA. We watched LSU. No disrespect, we just didn’t think they were better than what we had played.

ASST. COACH JAMES JOHNSON: (Florida) had a lot of pros. They were very similar to us, but they were bigger, longer, more athletic at every position. They had two guys that score inside with (Joakim) Noah and (Al) Horford.

CAPUTO: As we watched (film), we almost felt they were a better version of us in some ways. Just bigger.

JOHNSON: As we’re going out to the court, the walk seemed like it was five minutes. Coach L looks up, and he’s like, “Oh, boy. What time is kickoff?”

O'CONNOR: When the game started and they came out for warmups, playing the fight song and everything, it gives you goosebumps to even think about it. I’m getting goosebumps right now.

BUTLER: We didn’t have a rhythm at all, either side. It just felt weird. That was the first game I would say I just didn’t feel comfortable we were going to win.

LARRANAGA: We were only down five at the half. We had been down seven to North Carolina and nine to Connecticut. So it wasn’t the halftime deficit. It was how good they were inside. We were trying to make some adjustments. But the adjustment was probably the worst thing we did. We helped off of their three-point shooter, (Lee) Humphrey. He was a lights-out three-point shooter, but he hadn’t hurt us really in the first half. So we decided to help off of him a little bit more, and it was disaster. He made three straight threes to start the second half. The lead went from five to (12). We were never able to get it back under control.

ASST. COACH SCOTT CHERRY: Jai (Lewis) and Will (Thomas) just couldn’t do what they did against U-Conn. to Corey Brewer and Al Horford and Joakim Noah. It was hard for our guys to score against two NBA all-stars. It was a different athleticism, a different length.

[Michael Wilbon column: Florida's Donovan Casts a Spell of His Own]

BUTLER: That game, I actually blacked it out until last year. I watched the film for the first time last year around this time. I called Coach L right after. He said, “Yeah, we should have made some adjustments.” We talked about it. I just wanted to know what happened. It was a tough pill to swallow. It still is, actually. I just never got over it.

LARRANAGA: He was exactly right. What we should have done is set more ball screens and take their bigger guys away from the basket. Instead of like we had in the previous games just pounded it inside, we needed to take their big guys away from the basket. Not challenge them, but make their guards play. And I didn’t do that.

The Gators led throughout the second half and pulled away for a 73-58 win that put them in the national championship game and ended George Mason’s season.

BURNS: We felt if we would have won that game, we would have won the national championship.

NORWOOD: The seniors were basically breaking down. Lamar’s a pretty emotional guy, and you kind of expected that from Lamar. But to see Tony (Skinn) and Jai also in the same boat, who are a little more reserved, seeing that hurt.

CHERRY: They were devastated. They really thought they had a chance to win a national championship.

JOHNSON: The guys were on the bench, heads in their hands. We had guys crying. A lot people said, “You guys made it, you’re a mid-major, you went to the Final Four.” Our guys felt like, that wasn’t enough. We wanted to win. I just remember the hurt.

LARRANAGA: After the Florida game, we were walking out of the locker room together, and I put my arm around Lamar, and I said, “You know, I’m mad at you.” And he looked at me, “You’re mad at me?” I said, “Yeah, remember back in October when (sports psychologist) Dr. Rotella was here? You said you dreamed we went to the Final Four?” He said, “Yeah!” I said, “You should have dreamed we won the national championship.”

MERTEN: The run to the Final Four was one of the highlights of my life. And it still is.