The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
Good
-The Quick Change couple sounded pretty lame when we read it on the lineup card but wow, it was actually pretty amazing. Kudos to GMU for booking the former America’s Got Talent duo. I once saw Erik Copes rip off his warm up gear in just under a 1 second only to foul out 2 mins later.
-The dogs, again, another lame sounding performance that actually turned out to be pretty spectacular and delivered some of the loudest crowd reaction of the night. These dogs were jumping, twirling, spinning, catching Frisbees; you could make an argument that they almost stole the night. Troy at one point was holding the entire team back (a la Monmouth bench) after a dog caught a Frisbee.
-Green Machine delivered another classic opening intro. What else can you say about the nation’s number one pep band? They killed it.
-50 years of Mason Basketball. The hype video did just that, it hyped me, hard. It was great seeing clips of Mason greats coupled with some of our current players. Really put the program in perspective.
-The Dunk contest. Finally, after years of doing the same open scrimmage, we fans got to enjoy a more entertaining contest. Troy and Jai (Boogie) specifically delivered some legitimate dunks…like; I was actually kind of blown away (check out our IG for slo-mo videos). Also cool seeing Darrel Green as one of our celebrity judges, welcome to Mason Nation.
Bad
-The Dunk contest. Yes, yes, the dunk contest was awesome but it would’ve been a little better if our participants actually made a few of their dunks. Some of our freshmen had such ambitious first dunks that they couldn’t even make them in the time allotted. Maybe save the 360-windmill-behind the back dunk for the end? Oh well.
– There were some awkward transitions right? Green Machine delivers a loud, high energy performance and then…. Silence… Cough, cough……crickets……someone pick up a microphone!
Ugly
-What the hell was that choir singing at the end? I legit thought it was a funeral service and decided to bounce before they could finish. Nothing pops the season off quite like a solemn, eerie performance of Man in the Mirror performed by bunch of school children. Yikes