There was a weird scene on Saturday evening as Ohio State hosted Appalachian State.
Early in the second half, a fire alarm went off as the game as being played, which was followed by an announcement played over the PA asking everyone to evacuate the arena.
And it was all captured live on the Big Ten Network:
Play has been stopped at Value City Arena in the @OhioStateHoops/Appalachian State game after an emergency alarm went off. The floor and seating area was evacuated.
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) December 17, 2017
We will give updates as soon as we have more information. pic.twitter.com/cMil3hAqVK
The game was eventually continued, and it appears that the incident was nothing more than the fire alarm working the way that it is supposed to. From a statement released by Ohio State: “Tonight’s event was interrupted by a failure on an exhaust fan. The fan shut off and allowed the smoke from a concession stand to enter the fresh air return on one of our air handlers and activated one of our smoke detectors. The building systems worked as they were designed and we were able to reset the alarm, repair the exhaust and return to normal operations.”