Even after seeing it, Juan Dixon wasn't sure how to address it. Even after seeing a touted NBA early-entry candidate like Indiana's slender Jared Jeffries muscled out of the picture all night by Maryland's beefy, pro-style front-line big men, Dixon, a player who stayed at college five years and has a national championship to show for his patience, chose his words carefully on the subject of staying or going.

	Maryland's Lonny Baxter showed Jared Jeffries what life in the land of wide-bodies is all about.

"I don't know what to say about that," Dixon said. "I had a lot of fun in college. I developed as a basketball player each year. Really, college is a lot of fun to me.

"It's a good experience. I learned a lot. You know, a lot of guys are talented; they're able to come out early. I mean, it's up to them."

And it bears a strong reconsideration.

To have watched Jared Jeffries in Monday night's NCAA men's championship was to have understood the fundamental difference between what people think about life in the NBA and ... well, life in the NBA, frankly.

As good as Jeffries had been, as much as he meant to an Indiana team that defied conventional wisdom at so many points through the tournament -- that's exactly how overmatched the 6-foot-10, 220-pounder appeared against Maryland. The Hoosiers' best post threat scored eight points, committed four turnovers and spent most of the night in foul trouble. He spent more time on his back than above the rim while getting bounced around by the likes of 260-pound Lonny Baxter and 247-pound Tahj Holden, and Jeffries' own teammate, Tom Coverdale, noted afterward that Maryland "didn't have to double down as much, (so) they could just lock on our shooters" and make Indiana work for every outside shot as well.

It might have struck someone as instructive, the difficulty Jeffries had in getting off his shots. It might have struck someone as instructive that Maryland didn't need to double-team him to eliminate his offensive threat.

It might, except that it usually gets lost in the shouting. Even in the immediate aftermath of Indiana's 64-52 defeat by the Terrapins, the 20-year-old Jeffries found himself being asked the NBA question yet again.

"I'm going to take a little bit of time to just kind of decide what's going to be best for myself and my family," Jeffries said. "I mean, this (Indiana experience) is definitely going to weigh into my decision, just because it's such an emotional thing. It's such a large part of my life right now."

You have no difficulty imagining Indiana's basketball future with Jeffries aboard. He becomes the cornerstone of this new program Mike Davis is building, on a team that loses only guard Dane Fife and forward Jarrad Odle from a Final Four entry. He becomes the home-grown Indiana basketball player who symbolizes life after Knight, the resuscitation of a college team that sometimes can appear to be choking on its own history.

And he can do that, Jeffries can. He can be to Indiana what Juan Dixon became to Maryland. Dixon redshirted one season and then played four years, and the final game of his college career was a national championship of which he was the catalyst, after a season in which he had been acclaimed one of the finest players in the nation.

But the NBA wants Jared Jeffries, so it's said; and you have no trouble imagining that scenario, too. That's the raw-recruit angle, the one in which some pro team drafts Jeffries not because he can help it now, which he probably can't, but because he represents future value -- and there is nothing more precious in the NBA, nothing held more closely, than future value.

The word is that pro scouts, who tend to discount tournament performances in favor of their season-long evaluations of talent, figure Jeffries for a sure first-round draft pick, if not a lottery pick. It seems like the most unbelievable stretch, considering how Jeffries struggled on the floor against Maryland's strong, rangy defenders -- but that's the difference between what the eye sees and what the talent evaluator projects.

Jeffries has talent and smarts, and he can be made stronger and thicker, if the pro game so demands it. He won't embarrass himself out there, put it that way. But that isn't to say nothing will be lost in the transition.

You'd think the Maryland story would suggest something important, and perhaps it does. The Terps won it all with three seniors very prominently displayed: Dixon, Baxter and guard Byron Mouton, who played his final two NCAA seasons at College Park after transferring from Tulane. Maryland's march to the championship looked almost like an orderly progression, from improving power to Final Four entrant a year ago to the title in 2002, with players experienced enough to maintain their composure down the stretch Monday night.

"I'm just so happy for the players, to see what they did," said coach Gary Williams. "Because it's just an amazing thing to watch Juan Dixon, Lonny Baxter for four years, to know both those guys for four years -- what they were and what they are now."

It is a joy few college coaches find, not only because so few of them get to stand on the podium and hold the trophy but because so few of them get to see a player, any player, stick around for four years if the NBA becomes an option at any point along the way.

Now it's Jared Jeffries' turn. If he stays, says coach Mike Davis, "his development, to me, is right on schedule to being on of the best basketball players in the country."

And if he goes, well, he gets drafted. And no one will tell him he's making a mistake. Not even a guy like Juan Dixon, who actually might be able to say it and mean it.

Mark Kreidler of the Sacramento Bee is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.