BLOOMINGTON — Deep in the throes of a woeful season seemingly getting worse with each passing game, Indiana men’s basketball experienced a night unlike most others this year.
It’s not just that the Hoosiers snapped a four-game losing streak with a 74-70 victory over Wisconsin on Tuesday. It’s what transpired both inside and outside of Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall that led to the result.
Kel’el Ware caught fire and rode it to one of IU’s strongest individual performances of the season. And as that played out, Assembly Hall dealt with an actual fire scare.
‘The best player on the floor’
Ware got started early, with a defensive rebound on the game’s first possession. And he soared from there.
The sophomore dominated, particularly in the first half. By halftime, Ware racked up 20 points on a 9-for-10 clip, with seven rebounds and three blocks. He just overpowered Steven Crowl and the Badgers’ frontcourt.
Ware’s points came from all over. He scored in the post, in mid-range, and from beyond the 3-point line. There were stretches in that first half when it seemed like the center could score at will, regardless of what the Badgers did.
By the end of the night, Ware finished with 27 points on an 11-for-12 line, with 11 rebounds and five blocks.
“It was unbelievable. He had a man’s game. He really did,” IU head coach Mike Woodson said after the game. “Maybe we didn’t go to him enough, but he was fantastic tonight. We needed every bit of it in order to win this game.”
Ware missed Indiana’s first matchup against the Badgers in Madison. His absence was noticeable in that game, as IU lost by 12.
Wisconsin limited Ware’s looks some more in the second half, as he had just two points in the first 13 minutes after halftime. But he was able to redevelop the sort of rhythm he had in the first half, scoring some important points for IU when the Badgers made their push.
Wisconsin head coach Greg Gard lamented his team’s defensive performance against Ware but praised the sophomore several times after the game, saying he had “an All-American-type night.”
“Ware and (Malik) Reneau have been really good. I don’t know if this is the best that Kel’el’s played, but it’s got to be right near the top,” Gard said. “The credit goes to Ware, specifically, and to Reneau for the job they did inside. Kel’el was the best player on the floor. He was really good tonight.”
Ware has been Indiana’s most consistent player all season, and has had plenty of other big games this season. This wasn’t even his highest-scoring game of the year — he put up 28 points against Harvard, on a 12-for-13 line.
The sophomore has recorded eight 20-point games, and 12 double-doubles. His 23-point, 10-rebound effort during IU’s win over Iowa was one of the team’s grittiest performances of the season.
Entering Tuesday’s game, Ware ranked third in the Big Ten in rebounding, sixth in blocks, and 15th in scoring. He entered this season at IU with some question marks surrounding him after a tough freshman year at Oregon, but he’s been as good as IU could’ve realistically hoped for.
Ware is firmly on the All-Big Ten radar, because of performances like these.
A chaotic scene
Ware wasn’t the only thing in Assembly Hall that was hot on Tuesday.
A fire alarm went off in one of the balconies and spread to the concourses on both sides of the arena around the under-12 media timeout. Wisconsin’s radio broadcast reported smoke in an elevator set off the alarms.
The game went on for a few minutes as the alarms continued going off, but some fans made their way towards the exits even with play ongoing. And then more fans. And then even more.
Then, out of nowhere, the game stopped. The public address system cut out. The scoreboard displayed a generic IU logo. Teams retreated to their sideline, and soon their locker rooms. Security guards and emergency personnel sprung into action, more sternly alerting fans to evacuate the building.
But fans, media, and others in attendance didn’t know why the evacuation was happening. Nobody delivered a clear message within the venue, whether there was a fire or if it was related to the tornado warnings throughout the region. And that uncertainty caused some apparent hesitation for some people about going outside — closer to windows — if it was tornado-related.
But arena staff continued to assertively direct fans to get up from their seats and find the closest possible exit. And it led to a chaotic scene in Assembly Hall’s south lobby and in the space outside it.
Fans flocked to the doors, with many carrying concessions they’d already bought. One man approached an exit holding a beer can, and a security guard stopped him and told him he had to drink it before leaving; he wasn’t allowed to take the beer outside the building — as outlined by Indiana state liquor laws — even during a fire alarm evacuation.
Outside the arena, fans crowded the space by the doors. They tried to stick together with their groups as much as possible as more and more people flooded the area. It was a hectic scene — and it remained that way when everyone was apparently informed they could re-enter after just a few minutes outside.
A sizable number of fans didn’t come back after the evacuation. The ones who stayed kept Assembly Hall loud as Indiana pulled out its 15th win of the season.
This sort of thing doesn’t happen regularly. Asked if he’d ever encountered anything like it, on his way to the exits after the game ended, longtime IU radio voice Don Fischer laughed and said, “Never had one of those.” Both Woodson and Gard said they, too, had never experienced a situation like this.
When play stopped, Wisconsin was on a 9-2 run over the previous four minutes of game time. The Badgers had tied the game at 54 apiece less than 30 seconds before the stoppage. They continued that run when the game resumed, but Gard clearly thought the pause in action impacted his team’s momentum.
“I thought it was a great timeout for whoever from Indiana pulled the fire alarm, for them. Cause we were making a run,” Gard said. “I mean, we had a little time in the locker room, not as much as what they originally had told us. And then you get five minutes to go warm back up and go play. So was kind of like having two halftimes.”
The game went back and forth the rest of the way after play resumed. The Hoosiers pulled it out because they held Wisconsin scoreless for the last two minutes of the game.
This win is a reprieve for Indiana during a rough month of a rough season. The result doesn’t change anything about IU’s season.
But the way it played out, with Ware’s heroics and the mid-game evacuation, may help this game stick out in the minds of those who both left Assembly Hall and came back in.
“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,” Woodson said. “So I truly thank the fans.”
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