The teams returned to locker rooms before resuming play.
Indiana men’s basketball’s 74-70 win over Wisconsin on Tuesday night at Assembly Hall was briefly interrupted when fire alarms began to sound in the second half.
The sound of an alarm broke out with lights flashing throughout sections of the arena and fans began to file outside, but play on the court continued until just under ten minutes were left in the half with the game tied at 54 apiece. At the time play was suspended, Wisconsin had scored 4 straight points to even up the game.
Both teams returned to their locker rooms as an automated voice instructed fans to exit the arena.
Different stories began to spread throughout the arena and online. Some said there was severe weather in the area others pointed to a potential fire. The ultimate cause was revealed via an official statement:
Per an official statement from IU: A fire alarm went off in one of the balconies. Staff followed procedure in evacuating the building. Once it was determined there was no immediate threat, fans were allowed back in. #iubb
— Zach Osterman (@ZachOsterman) February 28, 2024
Still, fans had filed out of the arena. At least one poor sod who’d bought a beer was stopped by a security guard and told to finish it before leaving the building.
I just witnessed a security guard tell a fan holding a beer walking towards the exit that they had to drink it before exiting — they weren’t allowed to take it out of the building — even during a fire alarm. #iubb
— Seth Tow (@SethTow) February 28, 2024
Play ultimately resumed with some fans returning to their seats. Each head coach had something to say about the pause in postgame press conferences.
Here’s what Mike Woodson had to say:
“First of all, I want to thank our fan base, the crowd for going through what we all went through and still came back into the game and gave us the support we needed to get over the hump and win the game. I truly thank the fans. It’s the first time I’ve ever been a part of something like that as a player and coach. When you go in the locker room, you’re trying to clean up things going on during the course the game, especially the second half when we got going, and then try to get offensive plays in quickly so they know what we’re doing when we come out to start play again. It’s a tie game. I thought we played well early. Wisconsin, they’re well-coached. They’re not going to ever quit. They pushed us to the end. I just thought we held in there after even going down. I think we went down three and Mack hit a big three to tie it. From that point on we never looked back.”
Here’s what Greg Gard had to say:
Greg Gard asked about the fire alarm situation, said he’s never had a situation like that happen.
“I thought it was a great timeout for whoever from Indiana pulled the fire alarm cause were making a run.” #iubb pic.twitter.com/j5SJDaXRhY
— L.C. Norton (@ByLCNorton) February 28, 2024