“This is Steve Tasker, sideline reporter for the Super Bowl 47. If you’re expecting to hear our friend Jim Nantz, it may be a moment before he gets on.”
When the audio of Super Bowl XLVII between the San Francisco 49ers and Baltimore Ravens all at once scale down out early within the 3rd quarter on Feb. 3, 2013, the thousands and thousands looking at the CBS broadcast would possibly have suspected one thing was once amiss.
When Tasker, assigned to paintings the 49ers sideline, was once the primary tonality somebody heard, it was once showed. There was once disagree energy within the broadcast sales space, elevators and escalators grassland to a halt and so did the sport — for 34 mins.
“Half the power in New Orleans stadium, the Superdome here, is out,” Tasker introduced to the arena.
For some Ravens gamers, the stoppage was once suspicious. Jacoby Jones had returned the second-half kickoff 108 yards for a landing, Baltimore was once 28-6 and the Ravens had simply sacked 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick on moment unwell. The Super Bowl was once about to be a rout and after the lighting fixtures went out? Linebacker Ray Lewis smelled a rat.
“You cannot tell me someone wasn’t sitting there, and when they say, ‘The Ravens (are) about to blow them out. Man, we better do something,’” he said in an interview for NFL Movies’ “America’s Game” next that hour. “That’s a huge shift in any game, in all seriousness.”
The untouched rationalization was once extra mundane. A newly put in software known as a relay routinely scale down energy to the stadium when the amperage crash a definite stage since the manufacturing unit settings had been too low.
Entergy, the native electrical corporate, vows that gained’t occur Sunday when the Tremendous Bowl returns to Unused Orleans for the primary presen in 12 years. The corporate not makes use of the apparatus liable for the power failure, there are higher redundancies for electric stream and the stadium has hosted greater than a decade of Unused Orleans Saints video games and concert events since with out incident.
GO DEEPER
From Super Bowls to ‘last resort,’ Michael Jordan to ‘No mas,’ the Superdome has seen it all
The ones concert events, considerably, have incorporated Beyonce, whose halftime display in 2013 preceded the power failure, and Taylor Fast, who introduced 200,000 enthusiasts to the Caesars Superdome over 3 nights in October.
“Some called that weekend the ultimate tabletop exercise,” Entergy stated in a commentary.
Generation the 49ers chortle at Lewis’ conspiracy idea — “We had the same delay they did,” offensive take on Joe Staley stated — there’s disagree query they benefited from the reset.
They barrelled into their depot room at halftime intent on solving the whole thing that had long gone flawed within the first half of, briefly going over the tactical adjustments they’d assemble. Later that they had nowhere to move.
A Tremendous Bowl halftime is two times so long as a regular-season model and since there was once such a lot staging apparatus, the gamers couldn’t get onto the ground. In lieu, they had been cooped up within the depot room.
The 49ers be aware that the Ravens were given away with a maintaining penalty in opposition to fullback Bruce Miller on Jones’ kick-return landing to begin the 3rd quarter. However there additionally was once a way that the lengthy halftime had an impact.
“I remember coach (Jim) Harbaugh coming up and asking, ‘Were we warmed up?’” the 49ers energy tutor on the presen, Mark Uyeyama, recalled. “And I go, ‘Uhhh — clearly (Jones) was.’”
The 49ers after ran two performs — a 29-yard move to Michael Crabtree and a 3-yard run by means of Frank Gore — earlier than Kaepernick was once sacked by means of Arthur Jones. Following that play games, colour commentator Phil Simms was once in mid-sentence when the published went still at 7:37 p.m. native presen.
The 49ers had the ball trailing 28-6 when the ability all at once went out within the Superdome. (Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Pictures)
An assault? A shooter? The ones ideas flashed thru everybody’s thoughts. The Sandy Hook capturing had came about a era and a half of previous and the 49ers were available at a recreation in Unused England the place the sufferers had been remembered.
“The first thing that went through my head is an act of terrorism,” then-49ers offensive coordinator Greg Roman stated. “And what’s coming next? First, they cut the power. And now what? My whole family’s there.”
“I honestly thought it was a terrorist attack initially,” stated Wink Martindale, after the Ravens’ within linebackers tutor. “You just didn’t know. Right away, you’re looking up where you know your family is sitting and everything else to make sure everyone was OK.”
Next a couple of moments, the ones ideas dissipated. There was once an preliminary groan from the population, however there was once disagree panic or commotion. The Superdome was once tranquility.
“To their credit, everyone remained calm,” Tasker stated in a telephone interview.
“Why is the clock stopped?”
Throwback to the lighting fixtures going out all the way through Ravens vs. 49ers in Tremendous Bowl XLVII 💡😳 pic.twitter.com/BD5qbuhjmq
— NFL Movies (@NFLFilms) December 25, 2023
He stated everybody’s first activity was once to determine what came about and the way lengthy the sport can be not on time. The sideline journalists had cancelled the usage of wi-fi microphones six years previous all the way through wet Tremendous Bowl XLI as a result of the ones mics had long gone out. Tasker had a cable hooked up to his mic in Unused Orleans that stretched simplest so far as the numbers at the ground. The league officers he sought after to interview had been safely huddled at midfield and didn’t need to be interviewed on digital camera. So he sauntered to midfield, were given as a lot data as he may just, after was once approached by means of Jim Harbaugh on his as far back as the sideline.
“He wanted to know what they told me,” Tasker stated.
The 49ers had a bonus in that they’d long gone thru one thing alike the hour earlier than when a transformer blew outdoor of Candlestick Terrain, inflicting two delays all the way through a “Monday Night Football” recreation in opposition to the Pittsburgh Steelers. Uyeyama stated he reminded gamers how neatly they’d treated that wait at the sideline.
“We were better prepared than we were against Pittsburgh,” Uyeyama stated. “And we’d put (Ben) Roethlisberger on his back all game. So we were walking around and communicating with the guys, ‘Remember, Pittsburgh.’”
The groups to begin with had been advised the sport would resume in about quarter-hour and that everybody must stay at the ground. They heard the similar chorus — quarter-hour — once they looked in next.
“The longer it went, you had to get yourself back in coaching mode,” Martindale stated. “It was like, ‘Holy s—, we have to start stretching.’ We knew we were in trouble. I know analytics say there’s no such thing as momentum, but that’s bulls—. The lights going out changed the momentum of the game. We were killing them when the lights went out. We had an older team than them and it really took us a while to get loose again and get going.”
Mentioned 49ers protection Donte Whitner: “Football is a game based on momentum. And whenever you have a lull like that, it’s a good opportunity for the team that’s not playing well to regroup and recover.”
He stated linebackers Patrick Willis and NaVorro Bowman mentioned technique. Justin Smith, the elder statesman of the protection, made positive everybody stayed targeted and quitness.
“I remember vividly hearing Dashon Goldson continue to say, ‘Not today. Not today. We’re too good. We’re too great of a defense,’” Whitner recalled. “And what he was referring to was, ‘Let’s not make the simple mistakes that will beat us.’”
The power failure formally terminating 34 mins and gave the impression to top to a excess momentum swing for the 49ers. (Jamie Squire / Getty Pictures)
On offense, Roman made just a fast discuss with to the depot room at halftime. The 49ers had scored simplest two ground objectives at that time and he had to remodel all of the recreation plan. Roman spoke in short to the gamers, after approached Harbaugh.
“I just said, ‘Hey, Jim, I’ve gotta get upstairs and get things figured out,’” Roman stated.
He was once again within the tutor’s sales space earlier than Beyonce started her display and felt excellent concerning the alterations he’d made.
“Then they returned the kickoff and it was like the price of poker has changed even greater,” Roman stated. “It was like, ‘Oh my God. Now we’re in quite a hole.’”
He made much more changes later the stadium misplaced energy. The radio headsets connecting him and defensive coordinator Vic Fangio to the sideline didn’t paintings and if truth be told had been one of the vital terminating issues to return on-line earlier than the sport resumed.
So Roman bounced performs and concepts off of receivers tutor John Morton. The 49ers would run the ball every now and then to stock Lewis and the Ravens protection fair. In a different way, they’d assault during the wind.
“We were gonna be ultra-aggressive,” Roman stated. “We had so much talent on the team, it was only a matter of time.”
He was once proper. The 49ers punted instantly later play games resumed however scored on a 31-yard Kaepernick-to-Crabtree move once they were given the ball again. Later they scored on their upcoming 3 possessions, slicing Baltimore’s top to 31-29 with slightly below 10 mins to play games. It was once as though the power failure had created two distinct video games.
“It was like a track meet from that point forward,” Roman stated.
However life the Ravens scored over again — on a Justin Tucker 38-yard ground objective — the 49ers offense were given slowed down deep within the purple zone within the ultimate mins.
San Francisco gave the impression to have a admirable shot for a go-ahead landing later Gore’s 33-yard run to the 7-yard form with 2:39 to move. That elevate, then again, left Gore — one of the vital perfect short-yardage runners within the NFL — winded and his alternative, LaMichael James, was once cancelled for a 2-yard acquire on first unwell.
A quarterback keeper that most likely would have scored a landing was once burnt up when Jim Harbaugh known as a timeout to keep away from a play-clock violation. When the terminating of 3 throws to Crabtree within the nook of the top zone sailed over the receiver’s head, the Ravens knew that they had after all halted San Francisco’s momentum and held on for the win.
“If we would have lost that game, I would have walked away saying, ‘It was because the power went out and the long delay,’” Martindale stated. “We were just killing them otherwise.”
Mentioned Roman: “Unfortunately, it just wasn’t enough. That was a bizarre day in our lives, for sure.”
Regardless of being the lone face and the tonality for the Tremendous Bowl broadcast for a couple of unsure mins, Tasker stated he didn’t obtain a lot consideration following the sport. In lieu, his telephone began blowing up six days next when “Saturday Night Live” — with Taran Killam taking part in Tasker — spoofed the power failure with a chilly distinguishable.
“That’s when I knew I’d finally made it,” Tasker stated with fun.
(Supremacy picture: Dilip Vishwanat / Getty Pictures)
