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Supporters of Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney celebrate during a Super Tuesday event at the Westin Copley Place March 6, 2012 in Boston.
Updated 9:52 p.m. ET — Republican presidential hopefuls started to tally wins from the 11 Super Tuesday contests as voting started to conclude this evening.
NBC News projected Mitt Romney as the winner in Virginia, Vermont and Massachusetts, the state where he served as governor. Newt Gingrich was projected the winner in Georgia, the state where he had served as a representative in Congress. Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum won in Tennessee and Oklahoma.
But the crown jewel of the Super Tuesday contests, Ohio, was declared "too early to call" shortly after its polls closed.
Romney and Santorum had waged a closely-fought battle over the state, a key bellwether in the general election.
Eleven states were playing host to nominating contests on Tuesday, which were poised to put the battle for the Republican presidential nomination on a path toward conclusion — or, alternatively, on a route that threatens a more prolonged, bitter fight.
More delegates were up for grabs on this Super Tuesday than had been previously allocated to the remaining GOP candidates after two months of voting, according to NBC News projections. Between the 10 states holding primaries or caucuses and Wyoming, which will allocate five of its 26 delegates, a total of 424 of the 1,144 delegates needed to win the nomination are at stake.
The eleven states in which delegates were at stake on Tuesday were Georgia, Virginia, Vermont, North Dakota, Ohio, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Idaho, Alaska and Wyoming.
"We're going to win a few, we're going to lose a few. But as it looks right now, we're going to get at least a couple gold medals and a whole bunch of silver medals," Santorum said at his election night party in Steubenville, Ohio before the state's results were announced. "We have won in the West and the Midwest and the South, and we're ready to win across this country."
"There are three states under our belt, and counting. We're going to get more by the time this night is over," Romney told supporters in Boston before firmly declaring: "I'm going to get this nomination."
In Ohio, both candidates spent much of Monday re-fighting their battle from just a week earlier in Michigan, where the former eked out a win in the state where he was raised.
During the intervening week, Romney has eaten into an advantage Santorum held in the polls; the state was seen as locked in a virtual tie between the two candidates by the end of Monday.
NBC's Andrea Mitchell, Chuck Todd and 'Meet the Press' moderator David Gregory offer election night analysis.
"It's gut-check time," Santorum said Monday evening in Cuyahoga Falls, where he assailed the Romney campaign and a supportive super PAC for blanketing the state in negative ads.
The pro-Romney forces had spent a combined $4 million on the former Massachusetts governor's behalf as of last Friday. By comparison, the Santorum campaign and a super PAC working on Santorum's behalf spent just over $900,000.
"I hope that I get the support of people here in Ohio tomorrow, and in other states across the country," a confident Romney told supporters on Monday in Youngstown. "I believe if I do, I’ll get the nomination."
If Romney accomplishes that, the fight for the nomination could move into a new phase.
A strong performance by Romney might have moved more Republicans who had harbored doubts about the ex-governor off the fence, and finally create some sustained momentum for him. That could point the primary toward an endgame.
Each candidate had emphasized certain contests as part of their Super Tuesday strategy. Romney had been expected to win Massachusetts, Vermont, and Virginia, where only he and Texas Rep. Ron Paul qualified to appear on the ballot.
Santorum focused on Oklahoma and Tennessee, where he proved victorious, but also traveled to North Dakota and Georgia.
The former speaker had called Georgia a must-win contest for him on Tuesday, given the flagging momentum for his candidacy ever since he won Jan. 21's South Carolina primary.
The ex-speaker vowed to push forward with his campaign in an occasionally awkward speech that dwelled for some time on the attacks and adversity faced by the Gingrich campaign.
"I want you to know that in the morning we are going onto Alabama, we're going onto Mississippi, we're going onto Kansas. And that's just this week," Gingrich said Tuesday night after taking the stage to wrestler Hulk Hogan's theme song.
Paul, meanwhile, is emphasizing the caucuses in Alaska, Idaho and North Dakota — states where the libertarian congressman is hoping his enthusiastic supporters will help him accrue delegates.
But while the candidates are battling for ever-important delegates, the biggest prize come Tuesday night may be the more nebulous concept of momentum.
"I think what he needs to do is he needs to over-deliver on expectations," said Bob Vander Plaats, a supporter of Santorum's, about what the candidate must accomplish.
Momentum can mean volunteers and donations that help candidates wage credible campaigns. It has come in fits and starts this cycle, as each Republican candidate has failed to string together a meaningful streak of victories.
Romney could accomplish just that on Tuesday, though, adding to the air of inevitability surrounding his candidacy.
"At the end of the day, people have to make a choice about who can go toe to toe with the president," said Ohio Rep. Steve LaTourette, a Republican supporting Romney. "He was always the inevitable candidate — there were just bumps in the road."
A quick conclusion to the primary would be appealing to some Republicans, who have begun voicing a new sense of urgency about the need to pivot toward the general election given the increasingly negative public perception of the primary. New data released Monday suggested voters are souring as a result of the primary.
Forty percent of respondents, for instance, said in Monday's NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll that the primary process has given them a less favorable opinion of the Republican Party. And more independent voters said in a separate Washington Post/Pew Research Center poll that their impression of the GOP candidates was getting worse as a result of the primary than those who said their opinion was improving.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., who endorsed Romney on Sunday, suggested the time for rallying around a candidate may be nearing.
"Somehow there's a process that's at work here that I think will allow our party to sort of go through identifying where, perhaps, there may be some differences, but then finally come together, transcend them, set them aside and rally behind a hard-fought message and platform that is directly focused on growing the economy," the No. 2 House Republican said Monday on Fox News. "And I think with Mitt Romney's unveiling of his economic plan last week, that is exactly what's happening right now."
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