For the first time in more than two decades, the Illinois men’s basketball team will still be dancing when the Final Four tips off.
Iowa’s underdog run in the NCAA Tournament ended Saturday with a 71-59 loss to a dominant Illinois team. Before Illinois could cut down the nets at Houston’s Toyota Center, a buzzer malfunction caused a loud, roughly 10-minute delay.
The buzzer initially sounded signaling the end of a media timeout with just under eight minutes remaining in the first half. The horn continued blaring for about another seven minutes.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Players stood on the court ready to play for a couple of minutes before both teams started to warm up as the buzzer continued to sound.
It was finally silenced, to cheers from the crowd, but then the main scoreboard and video screen that hangs over the middle of the court went dark. The game ultimately resumed with the big scoreboard still off. Two smaller scoreboards at each end of the arena were working.
In a statement, the NCAA later confirmed a malfunction happened when the scoreboard system froze, causing the horn to also freeze and blare uninterrupted for several minutes. The jumbotron was eventually shut off to silence the buzzer. Officials added that it could not be properly reset at halftime.
Freshman guard Keaton Wagler scored 25 points to help secure Illinois’ first Final Four berth since 2005.
This will be the sixth overall trip to the Final Four for Illinois, which has never won a national title. The Fighting Illini will face either Duke or UConn next week in Indianapolis.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Follow Fox News Digital’s sports coverage on X, and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
