Only in March.
Saturday’s Elite Eight showdown between Illinois and Iowa in Houston was delayed for 11 minutes, due to a broken horn at the Toyota Center.
Play briefly paused after the blaring arena horn signaled an end to the under eight-minute timeout in the first half.
And then it just kept going.
“Surely there’s a way to unplug this — surely there’s a horn expert somewhere in this building,” exclaimed legendary play-by-play voice Kevin Harlan.
“That’s right!” he added. “Cover your ears! Hide your eyes! The horn will not shut off!”
Averse to letting his team lose any momentum it had amassed so far during its March Madness run, Iowa head coach Ben McCollum urged officials to resume play to the soundtrack of the ear-piercing buzz.
The racket eventually subsided, prompting a chorus of applause throughout the arena — but then a section of the arena’s lights, along with the entire jumbotron, went dark.
The NCAA said in a statement after the game that the frozen horn was caused by a scoreboard malfunction, which forced them to shut off the jumbotron in order to stop the buzzer.
The NCAA also said an attempt to reset the jumbotron at halftime was “unsuccessful.”
For the remainder of the game, the horn was operated the old-fashioned way: a scoreboard operator using a manual air horn to stop and start the action.
Staying loose amid the commotion, Iowa star guard Bennett Stirtz drilled a three-pointer as soon as play resumed, giving the Hawkeyes an early five-point lead.
Illinois ultimately prevailed, 71–59, and will next take on either Duke or UConn in the Final Four on April 4.
