It begins at last.
All of the work, blood, sweat, tears and sacrifice have led to this. This is where the stuff of legends are made, where heroes are forged and the deeds of mortal men become the myths of tomorrow.
The Fugly Four has arrived at last.
Much like Syracuse's 2011-12 season, the Busted Mug Championship has been a weird, scary, ugly ride. But every rose, they say, has its thorn and the festival of fugly that is the BMC has brought out the best in its competitors. Many of the contestants have lived up to the hype and performed as expected. Still other have faced a longer, more diffucult road. None of that matters now, though. By whatever path, they've landed on the grandest stage.
The Fugly Four begins with a matchup between the #1 seeds in the Greg Ostertag and Jeremy Hazell regions.
Name: Mookie Jones (1, Hazell Region)
Team: F, Syracuse Orange
Path to Glory: Admittedly the inspiration for the Busted Mug Championship (along with Marquette's Darius Johnson-Odom), Jones' mug is about as busted as they come. The junior from Peekskill, NY missed the end of Syracuse's season, but that didn't stop him from rolling through Garrick Sherman and Jordan Theodore.
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Name: Frank Kaminski (1, Ostertag Region)
Team: F, Wisconsin Badgers
Path to Glory: It's almost unfair to include Kaminski in the BMC field. He's only a frosh, so he's bound to still be stuck in that awkward, pizza face stage. It's fitting that after the tilt between the Badgers and Orange in the NCAA Sweet Sixteen that they meet again for a rematch of sorts. Perhaps this time Jones will suffer the same fate of Ryan Kelly and Khem Birch, and fall at the hands of Kaminski.