WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – Inside Team Room B, an improbable dream still lived on for the Belmont Bruins. They had somehow jumped on Georgetown, to the delight of the small army of their red-clad fans and everyone else inside the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum who quickly joined in to cheer this little basketball team that wanted so badly to believe that its miracle slingshot could slay the goliath.

The Hoyas, the No. 2 seed in the East, had taken a 38-25 lead into Dressing Room D, but only because Harlem’s Jessie Sapp had emerged as an unlikely hero when he drained three of his four triples, and the Bruins remained convinced that anything was still possible. After all, they knew they had been down to Gardner-Webb by 18 and come all the way back.

“They may be the second-ranked team in this region, but they’re not Supermen, they’re not outplaying us on every single play,” Belmont coach Rick Byrd told his team. “We definitely can win this game.”

Then Superman showed up for the final 20 minutes.

Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap smaller Bruins in a single bound, the sleeping giant awakened with the kind of vengeance that will serve notice, first to Boston College tomorrow, then to the rest of the field, that the beasts of the Big East are a clear and present danger. There are no Georgetowns in the Atlantic Sun.

“They can win the whole thing without a doubt,” Byrd said after Georgetown’s 80-55 win. “They have athleticism, skill and they have a great coach who has a great system.”

Over those final 20 minutes, the poor Bruins proved to be little more than sparring partners for the bigger, faster, quicker, stronger Hoyas. Just another cruel reminder that often, in the very first Dance of March, one team shows up with McDonald’s All-Americas and the other team shows up with guys who eat at McDonald’s.

“We wanted to think that they had already made their run; little did we know they had another one waiting for us in the second half,” Belmont big man Boomer Herndon said.

When Sapp (20 points) starts raining threes the way he did yesterday, it isn’t just Belmont that doesn’t have a chance against Georgetown. It is everyone else as well, because it means that John Thompson III doesn’t have to beat you solely inside with 7-foot-2 Roy Hibbert and 6-9 Jeff Green.

Sapp, a 28-percent mad bomber, ended his 1-for-23 drought from the nation’s capitol by drilling four treys in six tries, three of them in the first half when the Bruins began to dare to dream.

“Their coach, after the game, we were shaking hands, said, ‘Where did the 28 percent come from?’ ” Sapp said with a smile. Belmont, meanwhile, which lives by the three, died by the three 3-of-18 (16.7 percent) from downtown Nashville in that second half.

“I think No. 21 hit three threes in a row, and in our scouting report wasn’t the greatest shooter,” Belmont junior Justin Hare said.

But if there are times when there is victory in defeat, this was one of those times. The Bruins kept right on playing, kept right on scrapping, all the way to the bitter end. They did themselves, and their school, proud.

“They played their ass off,” Big John Thompson said.

Now Byrd had to face his team for the final time. “I try to think of something funny when I know that I’m gonna break down and not make it through the talk,” Byrd said.

The Bruins’ one shining moment had came over the first 4:24, when they built an 11-4 lead. “I think they didn’t expect that we expected to win,” Belmont’s 6-10 center Andrew Preston (14 points in 19 minutes) said. The skinny Preston fearlessly went right at Hibbert, drawing an early foul on him. “I told him he could have played for me,” Big John Thompson said.

In the final moments before tip-off, Josh Goodwin, a 6-3 senior guard, had spoken up. “I don’t want this to be the last time that I play, so get out there and play your heart out,” he said.

They sure did.

steve.serby@nypost.com